November '25
Monthly design, film, and music roundup for November 2025.
Hi! Welcome to another one of these newsletters that I once again decided to write at the very last minute. November went by very quickly. I didn’t even realize the 30th was today until I saw Criterion Channel’s “leaving November 30th” and checked the calendar and sure enough, that was just a couple of days away.
Each month I sit down to write these and feel nervous for unexplainable reasons. Probably because writing was never my favorite and I’m worried I don’t have enough to say. Or what I’m saying isn’t good, it’s not well written, or interesting. I’ve been keeping up with AI development for a while, but in the past few months it’s accelerated at such a rapid, alarming rate that it’s really consuming my every thought. I am genuinely scared for the future of art, and the general literacy of the population that continues to engage with large language models.
With this growing fear and determination to keep my sanity and critical thinking skills, it’s given me a new outlook on how I approach this task of writing to you every month. I need to write, with my own thoughts, my own opinions, in my own words. Whether good or bad. I’ve set a goal for myself in the new year to be more curious, to read more, to write more. Make analog artwork. Lean into the process, and be more messy. Handcrafting as an act of defiance. It’s genuinely given me motivation to disconnect and slow down. So today I’m here to talk to you again about art and music, but it no longer feels like something I need to overthink or rush to get done. I’m happy I get to take time to reflect on things that make me inspired to make art every month.
DESIGN
The Fillmore reached out to me and asked me to submit a few concepts for Geese, a band I’ll admit I don’t know a ton about but I know their fans are dedicated and their art direction for their new album, Getting Killed, rocks. I sent over a couple of sketches, and the one we settled on was a killshot target poster, mirroring the cover that presents a gun pointed at the camera. Additional inspiration for the poster was Fortunato Depero, geometric Italian typefaces, early illustrated covers for Vanity Fair, and Robert Indiana’s American Dream portfolio. The original color palette I pitched as being pretty restrictive, but as you can see it ended up being very colorful (for the best).
This month I also had time to create something for myself made of random screenshots, archival scans, and found imagery lying around my hard drive. I didn’t really go into the piece with any motive or intention, just playing with puzzle pieces until I thought it looked right. Once it felt finish, I printed it and scanned it back into my computer for a nice paper texture. I really enjoyed this almost mindless process, I’ve got a ton of cool imagery that I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to repurpose, so maybe they belong in this new hard drive collage series.
MOVIES
This month felt very lacking in movie watching. I’ve been back on my true crime kick. Cinephile card revoked…..
Halloween III: Season of the Witch (1982) dir. Tommy Lee Wallace ☆☆☆½
I still haven’t made my way through all of the Halloween movies like I mostly have with Nightmare on Elm Street. However we watched this one on Halloween night because I remember reading somewhere that this one specifically was a good one to watch on Halloween. If you don’t know anything about this movie, Michael Myers is not in it. The intention with the continuation of the Halloween movies was to turn each movie into an anthology story; each movie being about a horror story that takes place on Halloween night. Season of the Witch was supposed to be the first of them, but bombed so horribly that they decided to bring the iconic killer back and only focus on him.
While the original Halloween that everyone knows and loves is known for being a POV slasher horror that helps define the genre, Season of the Witch pivots to a sci-fi folk horror. When a toy salesman is attacked and brought to a hospital clutching the year’s most popular Halloween mask, a doctor investigates the company Silver Shamrock and uncovers a very sinister secret. The story is incredibly unique and also very dark?? And gross. I didn’t know anything about this movie going in and there is a CERTAIN SCENE that genuinely had my mouth gaping open and I was not able to close it. I was looking around the room like ARE YOU SEEING THIS???
We had actually started watching it on Halloween night (fell asleep) and finished it on November 1st, which was the perfect way to watch this movie, in true Samhain fashion. No spoilers but the movie will explain why that alignment actually made perfect sense as a viewing experience.
Christine (1983) dir. John Carpenter ☆☆☆☆
Christine!!! I had never seen Christine. But it was leaving HBO so I knew I had to finally pull the trigger. Such a fun movie and was surprised I enjoyed a movie about a sentient car so much. The car itself felt very real and I loved all of the special effects. I was very curious about the regeneration scene and how it was filmed, so I had to do a little research to find out the special effect supervisor installed hydraulics that pulled the framework of the car inward, with the scene playing in reverse. They also used around 23 of the Christine cars.
Horror in the High Desert (2021) dir. Dutch Marich ☆☆☆
This one came per recommendation of my favorite horror podcast Bloodhaus, and as soon as I heard “unnerving found footage pseudo documentary about a missing hiker” I knew I was in there, immediately lol. Slow burn found footage movies, especially in the subgenre of mockumentaries, are rarely misses for me. Something about seeing interviews from family members and cryptic photos, leading us to their last moments alive captured on video truly gives me chills. Other movies that do this well are Creep, Lake Mungo, Willow Creek.
Horror in the High Desert is based on the real 2017 disappearance of Youtuber and experienced hiker Kenny Veach in the Nevada desert. Knowing that information and that it’s a found footage fake documentary, honestly go in blind, with as little information as possible. As soon as we get hit with “the following clip are his last moments, viewer discretion is advised” you know it’s going to get real… I was truly holding my breath with full body goosebumps. It’s what I love about the Blair Witch Project so much, the anticipation of the unknown.
This first movie set me up for a rare occurrence in which I immediately watched the two follow up films: Horror in the High Desert 2: Minerva, and Horror in the High Desert 3: Fire Watch (Tubi & rented from Prime). All are directly linked to one another and build off of the previous cases. Each contain that slow build of complete dread and anxiety. It’s not amazing by any means but this developing series has caught my attention and I’d love to see if they make another.
MUSIC
Albums I listened to this month….
I Just Remembered Everything Always Works Out for Me — Touching Ice
Liquorice — Hatchie
I Don’t Know How But They Found Me! — Jensen McRae
Let Them Be Alien — Lebanon Hanover
INSPO
Been thinking a lot about these Masaaki Sato paintings since I came across them earlier this month. The perspective and detail on these are so skillful. I get very strong Kusama inspiration from his works, and feel that they live in a similar world. These are oil on canvas, mostly created from 1970-1980.
And these incredibly detailed newsstand paintings
I’ve been following the project Dazy Chains by Hayley Mortin, a UX researcher and artist in Montreal whose work explores the intersection of fiber arts and AI systems, and the interwoven history of computers and textiles. Seeing the generative and analytical digital reference image go through both a machine and hand knit technique completely reframes and softens it. I love the outcome of taking computer images and incorporating them into art pieces, her artworks and research are super interesting and I highly recommend checking out the rest of her portfolio!
That’s all for now! Happy holidays and I’ll see you at the end of next month for a 2025 round up.
Always happy to see Hatchie on a playlist