@iconawrites

Art lover. Italian living in England. Wife of @knightandicon

 England, United Kingdom
iconawrites.substack.com
Joined November 2017
  • Tweets11.1K
  • Following2.4K
  • Followers38.5K
338Media
A little trip to Wells, in Somerset. ♥️
3
60
1,710
I moved to the UK many years ago from Italy. I was asked what’s a recent new cultural thing I discovered. Well, I met several South Korean people and learned about their country and cuisine. The UK is so international it exposes you to much, much more than British culture.
1
4
74
3,181
I speak Spanish almost as much as I speak English, because I have made Latin American friends through the Catholic church here. I have a Russian art tutor, and I recently befriended a Polish woman. Britain is infinitely bigger than Britain. That is its strength and its beauty.
12
618
Icona retweeted
Icona@iconawritesAug 18
Reading DOES take away time from practical work necessary for survival. But previous generations understood that taking that time, becoming educated and thus less easily controlled by the powerful, was vital. Don’t regress into thinking reading is a useless hobby for the wealthy.
Cora Harrington@CoraCHarringtonAug 18
Seeing more and more that people are positioning reading as an activity only the elites can participate in, and that is a deeply conservative point of view. Unironically, the notion that education and learning and knowledge is for elites is how we got here.
9
897
8
3,881
48,226
Reading DOES take away time from practical work necessary for survival. But previous generations understood that taking that time, becoming educated and thus less easily controlled by the powerful, was vital. Don’t regress into thinking reading is a useless hobby for the wealthy.
Cora Harrington@CoraCHarringtonAug 18
Seeing more and more that people are positioning reading as an activity only the elites can participate in, and that is a deeply conservative point of view. Unironically, the notion that education and learning and knowledge is for elites is how we got here.
9
897
8
3,881
48,226
Circe in the Odyssey movie is like a Welsh witch in a Northern European-coded island. She’d be GREAT in a movie set in Britain, but here she’s just another sign of how much this movie does not give a toss about the Mediterranean civilisation it should be depicting.
1
41
2,099
Not a single one of the main characters is played by an actual Greek actor. It’s a movie by Americans for Americans about current American preoccupations. One of the great injustices of life is that Greece, which would do this so much better, does not have the budget to do it.
10
467
One good thing about the internet is that for whichever skill you want to learn, there are now countless free tutorials. You will find lots of drawing exercises like this on YouTube. Make the most of the tools we have, stay curious, and learn a new skill! 😊
Icona@iconawritesAug 9
Drawing ellipses, and understanding how they tilt based on the position of their axis, is an extremely useful drawing exercise for people of all skill levels. Anyone can start doing it with just basic tools. You can start drawing today!😊
1
1
18
1,777
Drawing ellipses, and understanding how they tilt based on the position of their axis, is an extremely useful drawing exercise for people of all skill levels. Anyone can start doing it with just basic tools. You can start drawing today!😊
1
16
2,672
A rising cost of living that makes people feel guilty for reading instead of hustling 24/7; a consequent increased dependence on AI because reading skills are declining; fewer entry-level jobs because AI is being trained to replace workers. What a GREAT society we are building!
Boze Herrington, Library Owl 😴🧙‍♀️
@SketchesbyBozeJul 31
It’s people who boast of never reading a book who should feel shamed, not the ones who read. The fact that in today’s society, reading is deemed more embarrassing than not reading says everything about how far we’ve declined, culturally and intellectually.
5
29
1,942
Remember a few years ago when there was a lot of talk about how young people should “get into coding”, and lots of people went into debt to study coding at university, and now due to AI the number of available entry-level coding jobs is gradually diminishing? Yeah.
3
13
1
160
3,814
I feel sorry for mathematicians. I also know several people in their early 30s who are translators and graphic designers who are either being laid off or told to use AI (their replacement) as part of the job. Do we realise how many lives are being disrupted?
Jacob Hilton
@JacobHHiltonAug 6

The future of human mathematics

Article · @JacobHHilton
3
5
29
2,649
In an era when people spend so much of their time staring at screens, doing something analog can be truly beneficial. You can start with little equipment. Below is a completely free hand drawing course, for example. You can use screens to learn a new skill with your hands!
Icona@iconawritesAug 7
This is exercise two of Draw a Box. It helps you improve your line quality and confidence. Instructions are freely available on the Draw a Box YouTube channel. All you need is paper and a fine liner. You can start drawing now! Do it with me, and let me know how you get on.😊
4
40
3,134
This is exercise two of Draw a Box. It helps you improve your line quality and confidence. Instructions are freely available on the Draw a Box YouTube channel. All you need is paper and a fine liner. You can start drawing now! Do it with me, and let me know how you get on.😊
1
12
4,106
Perhaps I am weird, but my reaction to AI has been to invest even more in my analog skills. I have been home baking, embroidering, sewing by hand, making art. Below is a free drawing course. Do it with me. Let’s be human together, and do what humans are meant to do.
Icona@iconawritesAug 1
For those of you who want to get good at drawing: this is exercise 1 of Draw a Box. The instructions are free on their YouTube channel and website. Took me less than an hour to do. Let’s do it all together; you can show me yours in the replies. Start practicing today!
2
54
727
17,596
I used to eat this cake all the time growing up in Italy: ciambellone allo yogurt di fragole. It’s made with strawberry yogurt, and it’s very soft. If you type the name in Italian on YouTube, you will find all the tutorials you need to make it. It’s perfect for summer!
1
1
28
1,535
For those of you who want to get good at drawing: this is exercise 1 of Draw a Box. The instructions are free on their YouTube channel and website. Took me less than an hour to do. Let’s do it all together; you can show me yours in the replies. Start practicing today!
3
3
2
103
20,888
I’m not affiliated with them, by the way. I have just been meaning to do the box challenge for a while. As you can see, you do not need any equipment other than printer paper and a fine liner. No more excuses, no more delays, it’s all free. Start now!
7
1,002
Icona retweeted
Icona@iconawritesJul 3
One thing you can do for free if you want to start drawing is look up Peter Han’s lectures on YouTube. He is the author of this great book, The Dynamic Bible, and he has videos where he shows you how to practice the fundamentals of drawing step by step!
7
479
3
3,994
109,046
Load more