Hello Chaos A Love Story: The disorder of Seeing and Being Seen

by Charlie Engman

Genres: Essays, Fiction, Art

182 pages, Hardcover

Published April 22, 2024

Reviews

[Olivia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very fun, charming and lowkey beautiful essay. read during a shift :) hello kitty x mickey fanfiction that is also philosophical??

[Georgia Evensen · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is actually profoundly philosophical and thought provoking

[Claudia Glenn · Rating 5 out of 5]

best book i’ve read in a long time. finished and immediately went back to the beginning to start again. so much to look at, so much to think about.


“kitty was finally ready, at the ripe age of fifty, for an authentic love that embraced the anarchy of existence emphatically, without temperance or equivocation.

she was proud to be a small and particular representation, a hopelessly and beautifully contingent version of that collective chaos.

she was proud to be a creature of unruly imagination—a cartoon cat-girl-question-mark that was tethered to reality but resisted its gravity, like a balloon at the end of a string.”

may we all learn to put a chip-clip on our overflowing sack of greasy desire.

[Linde Stevens · Rating 5 out of 5]

yessss kitty!!!

[Max · Rating 5 out of 5]

Really makes you think about the differences the media treats men and women celebrities along with other specks of identity crisis. I couldn’t help but only imagine the Mickey from South Park the entire time.

[K · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fabulously unhinged …. Hello Kitty x Mickey Mouse fan fiction / critique of consumerism

[h9nniie · Rating 5 out of 5]

The author claims Mickey to be gay but i think it was actually a combination of aromanticism, autoeroticism, and the curse of Narcissus. Kitty needs to stand up.

[✶ nu · Rating 5 out of 5]

delightfully unhinged

[Sai · Rating 3 out of 5]

so visual and textual and culturally contemporary But it does use ai hello kitty images l also cant remember what it says about horse shoe theory so need to revisit

[Jackson Coates · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really enjoyed. Even if someone were to never read the text or narrative, the design and evocative nature of its images would be enough to leave a lingering presence. As for the text...

A unique meditation on identity and codependency in the age of sloganeering, branded plastic trash. "Hello Chaos" personifies Mickey and Hello Kitty, creating an all new (at least to me) idea of sentient branded material. What does it mean to be replicated? Merchandized? And most interestingly, how has this life changed from their inception (in Kitty's case the 80's) to modern age, where now likeness has been more or less democratized, fan-fiction eroticism and co-opted for any one user's deepest desires. As generative AI and modern fast fashion landscapes sneak into the book's later pages, it really rounds out its chaos cycle.

Definitely at times steps into tumblr-esque melodrama, which imo can be forgiven since it adopts this gaudy landscape so sincerely. If it weren't for the 2014 pintrest/wattpad culture, this book may not exist in the first place, therefore, I feel like it should be given the clearance to add a lil bit of tumblr pastiche to its text. Though, this may be mileage varies

Kitty had no mouth, and no one to object to.

[Chloé · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very thought out and made me extremely uncomfortable In the best say possible

[Angela · Rating 4 out of 5]

Like wow phenomenal essay with awesome images... my ideal book. Read this while waiting for Anneke at the Centre for British Photo lol

[Lily Wang · Rating 2 out of 5]

some funny images i’ve already seen on the internet and a lesser discussion

[Dayna Cargill · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a ride. That’s all I’ll say

[Yeda Salomão · Rating 5 out of 5]

muito muito muito bizarro e muito bom!!! achei muito interessante a forma que ele debateu o self x o invólucro