A song is never played in full but becomes part of a collage of memory-dreams. For the visitor, following the evolution of his prose is a truly awe-inspiring experience.Ī rising and howling soundscape also plays a huge part in enabling Cave’s sensory presence throughout the maze.

That’s how Cave’s singular consistent obsession – with words in all their terror and grace – is completely seeped into the display. From Tolkien to Ondaatje to Beckett, words are the invigorating red thread running through all of Stranger Than Kindness. And they are taken seriously, these books. The sheer volume of items is phenomenal I was genuinely left wondering if Cave’s house in Brighton was now empty.Ĭase in point: he has provided his whole bookshelf, which stands freely in an immersive recreation of Cave’s creative spaces in the “office” section of the exhibition. Even at surface level the exhibition is so full of surprises and quirky items that I would’ve been thoroughly entertained with or without the deep dive.

But the digging is leisurely, not necessary. Like a detective scouring Cave’s surrendered items for clues to his artistry, there is an exhilarating sense that – with the help of plaques, booklets, sound and touch – one is peeling back layers to uncover something big. But here the worlds of the Cave multiverse exist in harmony: the letters, the figures, the paintings, the instruments. With a man of such manic productivity, the objects to choose from are endless. Here, in a sleek Scandi waterfront building – in itself, another plot-twist in the globe-trotting path of an ever-shifting artist – across 800 square metres and more than 300 items, is Cave’s life, work and art.įeaturing handwritten lyrics, photography, videos, set design and artwork, the show is a multi-sensory pathway through eight rooms, each dealing neatly with different themes within the 62-year-old’s multi-faceted creativity. It’s a collaboration with Arts Centre Melbourne in his native Australia, home of the Nick Cave archive. Stranger Than Kindness is a huge, memorial-style exhibition showcasing Cave’s four-decade career as a musician, author, performer, soundtrack composer and man of letters. But as he puts it in the 2014 auto-documentary 20,000 Days On Earth, he’s “always been an ostentatious bastard”. Not many people would admit that out loud. Nick Cave has long wanted a memorandum of his own life and work.

Stranger than kindness by nick cave