iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 12/10/2026

Ha, but how about Killers killers? I mean Ava Gardner in The Killers? (look at those ultra-wide cuffs!)

Ava Gardner lies on a bed reading a newspaper in 1946 film noir The Killers

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 12/10/2026

I don't remember acquiring this album of voodoo trance music but I can tell you that the last time it was borrowed from Swiss Cottage library was 23 April 1986. ebay.io/m/UtjiWG

Cover of album called 'Voodoo trance music ritual drums of Haiti'

000

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 11/10/2026

It's a slab of hipster architectural speculation from before the end of history. An implausible Koolhaas Argos catalogue that feels like it could only have come from before 9/11… My Amazon order history tells me I paid £28 for this thing, just after 9/11. So, obviously, £28 to you. ebay.io/m/HalMrt

200

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 10/10/2026

Are these the best Elvis Costello singles? Six of them, from Watching the Detectives in 1977 to Peace in Our Time (recorded as The Imposter) in 1983 (all six for £20, btw). ebay.io/m/uk7p48

100

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 09/10/2026

Get this: the programme for a 1949 Cambridge Theatre musical revue called Sauce Tartare, which just happens to be one of Audrey Hepburn's earliest theatrical roles - she was in the chorus line and has a credit! ebay.io/m/sjJ2r4

Cover of a 1949 theatre programme for a West End revue called Sauce Tartare

110

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 09/10/2026

So, hold on, Spizzenergi was the THIRD in the sequence of Spizz band names, coming after Spizz 77 and Spizzoil (also the first proper gig I ever attended, at the Bowes Lyon House in Stevenage). And 'Where's Captain Kirk?' was the band's first hit, reaching No. 1 in the indie chart. ebay.io/m/Woofyq

Bright yellow front cover of 1980 7" single 'Where's Captain Kirk'

100

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 09/10/2026

This Simon Linke catalogue is almost 40 years old. I was going to say that in those days he was known as the guy who painted meticulous copies of Art Forum ads but it turns out HE STILL IS. Something of the monomania and circularity of high conceptualism in this if you ask me. ebay.io/m/iur79M

Front cover of a 1989 exhibition catalogue of work by Simon Linke

Printed reproduction of a painting by Simon Linke

100

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 09/10/2026

My mother collected this kind of porcelain tableware. It's a set of six Villeroy & Boch art nouveau plate ladies! (and there's more of her china in my eBay listings). ebay.io/m/cjMVyc

Six plates decorated with art nouveau designs

100

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 09/10/2026

A comicbook written and illustrated by Studio Ghibli's Hayao Miyazaki himself! Nausicaä, part 1. ebay.io/m/LwnoES

Front cover of Nausicaä, a comicbook by Hayao Miyazaki

100

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 09/10/2026

Two novels by Trinidad's great Earl Lovelace, 'The Dragon Can't Dance' & 'Salt'. Lovely Faber paperbacks. ebay.io/m/7hrkJN

Front covers of two novels by Earl Lovelace

100

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 09/10/2026

Bagged and sealed in a pink polythene wrapper, a special edition of The Face - the Sex issue - from November 2000, a bit of a golden age, for this and other magazines, in design terms, I think you'll agree. ebay.io/m/AKuH4w

Cover of the Face from November 2000 - the Sex issue

100

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 09/10/2026

A commercial Super-8 release of James Whale's extraordinary 1933, pre-code Invisible Man. Silent and only eight minutes long. This is how we used to entertain ourselves in the 1970s. Seriously. ebay.io/m/GyJYTi

Cover of a super-8 release of The Invisible Man

120

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 09/10/2026

A splendid 1990s remaster of a 1981 Suicide gig - Ghost Riders (including a second disc of early rehearsals that sounds like something from a kind of downtown inferno). ebay.io/m/4hPirI

Front cover of a CD by Suicide called 'Ghost Riders'

100

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 09/10/2026

When Kitaj and Bacon were asked to choose their favourite works of art from the National Gallery in London - two lovely 1980s catalogues. ebay.io/m/FOsXI0

Two National Gallery exhibition catalogues

110

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 09/10/2026

Join me on a journey through the shit I'm selling on eBay. 1. 20th Century classical music on vinyl. Seven period LPs - Ligeti, Mahler, Berio, Janáček, Schoenberg, Cage… ebay.io/m/VzBCKR

Grid of classical albums for sale on eBay

131

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

To get the set you'll want the 'What would Robespierre do?' mug, with with inscrutable face of Edmond Van Daële as l'incorruptible (in his signature dark glasses): www.redbubble.com/i/mug/Napol%...

Mug featuring the face of Edmond Van Daële as Robespierre in 1927 film Napoléon

000

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Is it possible that the greatest film ever made is almost 100 years old? Acquire for yourself a Napoléon mug, with a red-tinted still of the fabulous Albert Dieudonné as early-career Napoléon. www.redbubble.com/i/mug/Napol%...

Simple white china mug with a design from 1927 film Napoléon

200

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 27/08/2026

It's what local objectors called Stevenage, the first of the UK new towns, begun in 1946. I can sell you a lovely t-shirt: www.redbubble.com/i/t-shirt/Si...

000

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 21/08/2026

If we actually get around to building any of the seven proposed new towns in Britain, can we call one of them SILKINGRAD?

Railway station sign put up in Stevenage in 1946 that reads 'SILKINGRAD'

120

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 15/08/2026

It's this fella's birthday. I mean Napoleon Bonaparte, not beautiful, wistful Albert Dieudonné, who played him in Abel Gance's gorgeous 1927 five-and-a-half-hour epic. Anyway, for the day that's in it, here's one of my favourite essays, about the film: bowbrick.substack.com/p/gross15-19...

010

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 12/08/2026

I need you all to understand that A BIRD ECLIPSED OUR ECLIPSE

020

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 01/08/2026

@cynderness.bsky.social @olchefdan.bsky.social I just discovered (via the Wikipedia entry for 'movies that feature flying cars' obvs) this implausibly sassy 1906, effects-heavy flying car movie that honestly looks like a pretty direct inspiration for all these movies!

120

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 27/07/2026

Thinking of taking up smoking so I can use these unbelievably cool matches from Club Enchanté in Cherry Hill, NJ.

Match book from Club Enchanté in Cherry Hill, NJ

000

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 26/07/2026

A short film about ancient times.

211

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 23/07/2026

Sparks and lightning bolts are a big theme in radio station identities from the early days. NBC alone had at least a dozen spark/bolt variations across the early decades.

010

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 23/07/2026

Before Mamdani there was Eugene Victor Debs. And in 1927 the socialists bought a New York radio station and named it after him: WEVD. This fabulous, ultra-modern SPARK logo dates from the 1930s. Buy a t-shirt (or a mug, or a sticker or whatever) from my Redbubble store. rdbl.co/4vIWhso

100

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 12/07/2026

I like the fact that they actually use both spellings of 'tyre'. Like my fave bagel place in London, which also uses two spellings (and neither is the most common!)

London Bagel shop with two spellings of Beigel and beigal

010

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 11/07/2026

No, Count Binface does not mean that British democracy is especially tolerant or accepting of outsider voices. Let's try not to be mugs: bowblog.com/2026/07/11/c...

Count Binface, novelty election candidate, wearing his distinctive dustbin-themed costume, at a microphone

100

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 03/07/2026

Did you see this green screen glitch in the BBC coverage? Where are they?

Screenshot of BBC TV studio for 2026 World Cup

320

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 03/07/2026

The interdimensional rift in the middle of the road in this old photograph of Youghal in County Cork is FREAKING ME OUT.

Black and white photograph from some time at the end of the 19th or beginning of the 20th Century, showing North Main Street and the Clock Gate in Youghal, County Cork, Republic of Ireland.

010

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 02/07/2026

If you're using a computer mouse now it's still essentially Doug Engelbart's 1967 design. You can own one of his original patent drawings printed on, well practically anything, really. Including, obviously, A MOUSE MAT: www.redbubble.com/i/mug/The-mo...

Computer mouse - original patent drawing with the name of the inventor Douglas C. Engelbart

Computer mouse - original patent drawings with the name of the inventor Douglas C. Engelbart

Computer mouse - original patent drawing printed on a mouse mat.

Computer mouse - original patent drawing printed on a t-shirt

000

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 26/06/2026

New Adorno t-shirt just dropped. Recognise the logo? www.redbubble.com/shop/ap/1818...

000

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 26/06/2026

By the middle of the 20th Century the idea that grown-up couples could separate just because they were unhappy was essentially universal and by the end of the seventies it had come to stand for individual autonomy, freedom from social repression and the liberation of women.

100

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 24/06/2026

Divorce peaked in the USA in 1979 so obviously the top-grossing Hollywood movie of that year was Kramer vs. Kramer. Since then, divorce rates have returned to the 100-year baseline and relationship movies are about dating disasters, toxicity and trauma… Essay: bowbrick.substack.com/p/gross70-19...

000

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 21/06/2026

Right, book nerds, if I don't shift all these books I'm going to have to set light to them on a boat and push them out into the North Sea or something. There are 101 books currently in my eBay shop, from every genre and at every price. Message me here for MATES RATES!

Grid of books Steve Bowbrick is selling on eBay

101

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 09/06/2026

Radio fans, I've added another station to my collection of vintage RADICAL RADIO merch: short-lived punk/anarchist/situationist/hippy/autonomist collective Radio Alice that lived for only a year in Bologna and was ultimately taken off-air, mid-broadcast by armed police in March 1977: rdbl.co/4wOdfYp

Graphic based on a flyer for 1970s Bologna radio station Radio Alice

010

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 07/06/2026

The Internet, which we thought was going to be liberating, turns out to be a tool of control: repressive, coercive and damaging to our most basic freedoms: bowblog.com/2025/10/29/b...

Opening paragraph of a blog post by Steve Bowbrick:
So it has come to us, in a kind of dissilusioning rush, and much too late really, that the Internet (which we still deferentially capitalise, as if it were an institution of repute or an actual proper noun) is not a good thing, not a good thing at all. The first universal network, connecting everyone and everything – premised on openness, on flattening hierarchies, on eliminating friction and permissions and coordination costs and barriers to participation and all that – turns out, ultimately, to be the domain, literally the property in fact, of hyper-pragmatic, parasitic hyper-capitalist accelerationists intent on diminishing and dehumanising us.

000

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 05/06/2026

"Destroy and destruction; they're the only two words I know. Destruction and destroy." Marvelous Marvin Hagler, one of the truly great middle-weights, defended his undisputed world title an extraordinary 12 times between 1980 and 1987. Throw cushion, t-shirt, stickers, the works: rdbl.co/4lfsOBl

Male and female models wear shirts with the slogan 'Destruction and Destroy'

Two photos together - Marvin Hagler, middleweight boxer, wearing his famous 'Destruction and Destroy' t-shirt. Alongside it a black throw cushion with the same slogan printed on it.

000

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 27/05/2026

Buy more than one item and Redbubble applies a 15% discount. They print in multiple locations and ship around the world. I chose them because the quality is good and they seem to be at the bottom end of the price scale. I think WEVD, with its dynamic electrical spark, is my favourite rdbl.co/4wOdfYp

000

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 27/05/2026

Radio friends, enjoy this collection of t-shirts (plus the whole panoply of other stuff: mugs, stickers, aprons, dog blankets and so on) celebrating RADICAL RADIO. The collection, so far, features designs for four famous radical stations: WEVD, EAQ, WERD and Rádio Portugal Livre…

Screenshot of Redbubble store showing designs for four different radical radio stations from around the world: WEVD, WERD, Radio Portugal Livre and EAQ

100

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 25/05/2026

You’ll be wanting one of these effortlessly cool ‘Stockhausen serves imperialism’ caps, modelled here by the creator: www.redbubble.com/i/hat/Stockh...

041

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 24/05/2026

IG is a company listed on the London Stock Exchange: largest institutional shareholders: Blackrock, Vanguard, Artemis…

Outdoor ad for investment company IG. Illustration of a fat cat waeting a suit. Text reads: 'Forget fat cat brokers clawing your gains.'

320

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 26/04/2026

EXTRAORDINARY SCENES over on eBay. Practically everything in my eBay shop - 200+ records, books and DVD/BluRays - is now priced below the lowest price I could find. It's a PRICE CRUNCH or something. Pick up a classic graphic novel or a Bucky Fuller book or an Orange Juice 12": bit.ly/bowbrick-on-...

Grid of items for sale on eBay - includes a biography of Groucho Marx, To Hell With Poverty by Gang of Four, a graphic novel called Patience…

200

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 26/03/2026

Detectorists, Great Yarmouth, around 2005.

Two detectorists work the beach at Great Yarmouth, behind them the stripey hot-dog stand and the sea. A high-contrast black and white 35mm photograph.

052

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 25/03/2026

Grease - 1978's top-grossing Hollywood movie and fixture in small town theatres everywhere - isn’t what you think it is. It’s a pretty dark and sometimes quite cruel movie and it has this startling, magic realist ending that I can’t stop thinking about…

110

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 23/03/2026

Grease. 1978's top-grossing Hollywood movie. Is the strange ending actually magic realism or is it really just a lazy resolution to a tortured and resistant text that honestly needed something… GROSS, the cinema history newsletter: bit.ly/4uN1KiJ

Still from 1978 film Grease with text overlaid: 'GROSS/69 - 1978 - Grease is a miserable thing but it has a magic realist ending that I can’t stop thinking about'

010

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 24/01/2026

One thing that I think is important, for those of who are not American, is to at least act like what happens there isn't important to us and that it is, in fact, laughable. I mean we live in a sovereign nation a long way away and we really shouldn't defer so pathetically to American pathologies.

The regal gold emblem of Donald Trump's Board of Peace with the words 'Board of Peace' replaced with 'Bored of Peas?' in a similar style

000

Steve Bowbrick @bowbrick.bsky.social · 17/01/2026

Crimewave still running out of control in London

020