Musician, yet self-described “non-musician” Brian Eno is perhaps best known for his work with Roxy Music led by Brian Ferry, but a series of posts on X, formerly Twitter, has revealed that the 2019 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee has an unhealthy obsession with Photoshop.
Eno published a series of diaries covering the year 1995, entitled A Year with Swollen Appendices, covering a period of Eno’s life when he was literally incapacitated with swollen appendices.
The diaries offer unique insight into the musical genius’ mind, but also numerous frequent references to Adobe Photoshop.
“I've never succeeded in keeping a diary past the 6th of January before (so I know a lot about the early Januaries of my life), but at the end of 1994 I made a resolution to keep one for 1995,” writes Eno.
“When I started I had no intention at all of publishing it. It wasn't until mid-October that I started to think that, with its mishmash of ideas, observations, admirations, speculations and grumbles, I might be able to make it a book.
Brian Eno's diary entries on being being addicted to photoshop (1995) pic.twitter.com/fmQkWrWaQlMarch 12, 2024
“Of course, a lot of these entries were written after a day's work, and workdays can be good or bad. The good ones produce a glow of congratulation, the bad ones a frenzy of recrimination. As a result some of my best friends - those people with whom I work most closely - occasionally come in for my grumblings. I assume they'll ignore them as usual.”
At one point, Eno recalls spending his days “modifying back views of women to expand their bottoms to cosmic proportions” using Photoshop, a time wasting habit he compares to chronic alcoholism.
"Too long playing with Photoshop - lethal time-waster - like chronic alcoholism. Should schedule it in the diary and not use it otherwise," reads one early entry. Another describes how he "wrecked the morning by resorting to Photoshop."
While this may sound juvenile, Eno’s Photoshop dalliances also took a turn for the existential. "My first Photoshop dream. I dreamed I was erasing my past in Photoshop, but it turned out that I was using the 'clone tool' - so instead of erasing I was just copying chunks of the past into the future."
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