tick tick tick tick

more and more, i've been thinking about philosophy- its relevance. its importance. philosophy as necessity. philosophy as NEED.

and like art, philosophy in this country is perceived as a pastime. something frivolous. something to take part in if you've got some spare time on your hands but not at all integral to daily life.

and how sad. how lost. ethics as an exercise in frivolity. it knocks the wind out of me.

and just as i think that an arts education should be mandatory; mandatory in the same way as literature and science and math, so too should be philosophy. how much cooler and progressive a world, a more humane world, if philosophy was part of standard education in high school. if philosophy was welcomed in to daily life.

i think philosophy is absolutely necessary- the ethic, well wrestled, well thought out, hard won code that governs a life. academia seems to be the only situation in which philosophic conversations are taken seriously. or the pockets it lives in when in discussion with close friends or colleagues who have a similar desire to live in a more conscious way, not just "go with the flow".

it is sad to me that in our common day-to-day existence, we are routinely asked, EXPECTED EVEN, to drop our philosophic code when it makes things even the slightest bit harder for others. and by 'harder' i mean less fun. what are ethics good for if i drop them when the tough times find me? isn't that when i need them most? when the temptation arises to skirt the hard responsibilities of my life and run? isn't that when a set of ethics is most needed?

but the trade is that sometimes you will walk the road alone. sometimes you will be Outcast. sometimes you will be Other. sometimes you will be Cruel or Crazy or Arrogant or Selfish. these are all titles that get applied in improper ways a lot of the time. it is not selfish to obey an ethical code. it's cowardly to not.

and all this is on my mind more and more. the more i read, the more i draw, the more i expose myself to the outside world, the more i find these deep pockets of discussion where art and philosophy are appreciated, nurtured, encouraged. and there is no rule that i must have all the answers RIGHT THIS SECOND... just that i try to head in a better direction. just that i am curious and open. just that i rinse the dust out of my eyes. just that i think.

too much! AHHHHHHHHHHHH!

deleuze and guattari make my brain turn to either soup or puke. bruno, i need you! help me understand d&g!

"...Ravaged."

last night i read 'The Lover' by Marguerite Duras from start to finish in one sitting. and how timely. how absolutely perfectly timed! and my head and body felt all floaty afterward, the way a person feels after being exposed to High Honesty... a religious experience almost. the story, the imperative, of coming in to your own, your way, without conditions or expectations, this perfect acceptance of self regardless of attack or time or family. and also the sadness of it. the knowledge that curls down, curls around your head and reaches in through your eyes down to your heart, the dreadful vine that twists that soft redness, squeezes it until it ruptures, the regret, the wish that it was somehow possible to be something you are not because it would be so much easier! but she doesn't do this to herself. she knows herself... ahead of time and walks in to the whole shebang willingly, with open eyes, a confidence beyond lived experience... her school-girl braids, the gold shoes... and then, her dream to write... just write. and i responded so powerfully to that. it has been how i have felt my entire life. this pull to JUST WRITE SOMETHING. and the deep level of trust she extended to herself, to her need, to her dream- that when the book in her was ready to spring out, it would. and i think that deep level of trust is the only way to get the job done. i think it is the prime ingredient. alpha and omega. art is so religious in some ways. the tenants we keep, the sacrifice and the faith and the blood rushing rushing rushing. the ecstasy! i am so deep in love with art, with all these books i've been reading, all these ideas and images and shades of darker darkest grey. in love in such a deep way as to feel myself, see myself, as i truly am and for a moment, inside that love, to feel no hint of shame. this mode is completely right. this way of being. this way of thinking. this catalogue of life. these vignettes. these offerings. a photograph never taken. a photograph laid on the alter. a human story of love and need and expectation... the large desire that won't be kept still, won't be left in silence, will not be ignored. gorgeous!

and right there on the first page : I often think of the image only I can see now, and of which I've never spoken. It's always there, in the same silence, amazing. It's the only image of myself I like, the one in which I recognize myself, in which I delight.

is this not what an art practice is? finding this image? the record that was never made, the photograph that was never taken... the absent image that is perfect and true and complete because of its absence.

i highly recommend this book. :)

and good morning!

spectacular!

and so now i circle back to 'The Society of The Spectacle' and i see how savvy it all is- mistaking appearance for reality... or, rather, accepting appearances as reality: 'seeing is believing' and all that. and just as Debord says, sight is the most easily tricked of all the senses. accepting appearances as reality is accepting a non-reality. it is living a lie.

so... how to crack this non-reality? how to create a fissure where the truth can actually be seen? how to establish a road toward hope where truth can even be recognized as such?

he says: In a world that really has been turned on its head, truth is a moment of falsehood.

how sad and how helpless we all feel sometimes. how inept, how confused, how forlorn and despairing. how sorrowful the world becomes when truth is denied for the sake of appearances.

a hand must be kept on hope. art is a way to find that hope. it can be the thing that encourages the crack in The Spectacle. it can be the thing that counters the upside-down appearance with an odd mirror that restores a true(r) perspective. the fast flash of undeniable reality, charged and angry and lovable- necessary.

the cost

i suppose the time comes for everybody... and maybe numerous times throughout a person's life- the need to evaluate, re-evaluate, define, and re-define the mode and means of one's own life. to discern a path that is true and respectful of who they are.

all my life, i have tried to be the bright spot in the lives of others. the thing that produced laughter and acceptance. the thing that was never disappointing, never hard. the thing that never called for struggle or extra attention, that never got in the way, that never made another person feel bad about themself. the thing.

the thing.



but i don't want to be a 'thing'. i want to be a human. i don't want to feel ashamed of being human. 'things' are perfect. 'things' make no mistakes because they have no desires, no goals, no dreams of their own. they don't learn, they don't make plans, they don't love, they don't hate, they don't aspire to anything. there is nothing for a 'thing' to figure out. they don't need to navigate, they sit in one place. they perform functions that are pleasing to the one who owns them. they do not ever dissatisfy or question or assert a will.

i am talking about the role each person plays. i am talking about waking up one day and seeing yourself, even if just for a moment, as you really are- flaws and successes, traumas and resilience, fear and pride.

i am talking about how one fits in... or how one goes about fitting in... especially within one's own family. how the time comes to create adult relationships, to overcome childhood, and relieve yourself of the expectations that came along for the ride back then. the survival techniques children learn to use become destructive and self-sabotaging if allowed to be used in adulthood. and so... i'm thinking there comes a time when detachment becomes (sadly) necessary. i'm thinking there comes a time for flying solo and enduring the confusion, the hurt, the rumours, the disappointment, the accusations... in order to finally be accepted for who you really are, not who you're expected to be.

the old role is no longer useful. in fact, it is only damaging.

this is something most people go through as teenagers. for some reason i thought that once you got through those years, the need to assert yourself, to find the courage to be true to yourself, to stand on your values and not lift your foot, would be assuaged. why did i think that this declaration would only need to happen once? and i'm not talking about being pig-headed or arrogant, i'm talking about the steps one takes in order to finally be healthy.

i have a deep, bad problem of remaining silent. maybe that is what motivates my practice? to speak somehow. to drop the role of "secret keeper". to expose the fissure, the crack that runs right down the middle of me. to expose the fault-line, the damaged joint, the wound that goes on weeping and weeping... in silence, undercover, hidden, ashamed, humiliated. the trigger.

hiding the wound does not help it heal. it causes it to fester.

exposure... letting in the air... becomes a need.




i have been warned, over and over and over again, that when a person decides to remove themself from the chaos and work toward health, that there will be people who respond to this good act with malice and spite. they will attempt to sabotage your attempts toward health through manipulation and out-right blackmail, whether emotional or otherwise.

most people in my life are so wonderfully supportive of my work and desire to repair the effects of trauma that i am overwhelmed by such a huge sweep of gratitude, an endless appreciation for who they are, a massive swell of love and happiness and playfulness even... but there are a few who aren't. and that cuts deep. they see my repair as a punishment for them and they are not pleased.




i was talking to a close friend about their experiences in AA and what they learned about addiction and toxic relationships- that they must be cut off instantly, swiftly, completely (at least for a time) in order for you to focus on yourself, your life, and how to heal. that just as alcohol isn't going to run away from the alcoholic, the enabled won't run away from the enabler. just as a recovering alcoholic does not hang out in bars, the enabler does not hang out with the damaged people who play on their compassions. the role must be set down and walked away from. the hook must be pulled out and let go.

this is a horribly painful thing to do.

the hook is in deep.

there is an empty place now where the hook used to be.

it would feel better to stick the hook back in than be left with such a huge gaping emptiness.

but the answer is no.

the hook stays out. the foot stays down.

it is horribly painful to maintain such an action. horrible, horrible, horrible. and shame and guilt leak thickly from the wound where the hook was... like a phantom limb, an ache that will not leave, that won't be ignored, a call that gets louder and louder and louder. love twisted by such deep regret, such guilt... the bad lesson that love requires sacrifice of self. the bad lesson that to care about one's own life in 'selfish'. that "if you really loved me..."

i spent 2 years locked inside a major depression. i will not walk back in to that. relationships that require me to be someone i'm not, to do what i'm told without question, without thought as to my total right to be healthy and safe, that pray on my compassion, that force me in to a life of secrecy and shame and overwhelming expectations for perfection, will be let go of. i do not care what it costs me. the cost of not doing this is so much higher.

i am so grateful my mother sprang in to action when she did... the gentle word, the offering of non-judgemental truth brought the lie down and i had a hand, finally, to grab and pull myself up.

it was a choice between my life and my continued obedience to someone else that put me in that big bad depression in the first place... the crushing guilt that followed my decision to choose my own life. the price of being someone else's savior is too great. it is your own life. this is not an exaggeration and it is not dramatic. it is the cut and dried truth. anyone who's ever lived under the crushing weight of perfectionism and obedience knows exactly what i'm talking about: that you are living a lie. that, after a certain point, you are not just a victim anymore, you are an accomplice as well. in order to live, the lie must be brought down.



there are people that think i am cruel. they don't know what i know. and i can take half the responsibility for that because i'm so good at being quiet. i'm so good at being a 'thing'. i've been so concerned with not disappointing anyone, never letting on about what the stakes really are, that of course they don't understand. i have to trust that, in time, amends can be made, and mistakes can be forgiven.

i will trust that healthy relationships are possible and i will not abandon that hope. i won't.

that hook... i won't even look at it.

more thinking...

i read guy debord's 'the society of the spectacle' today for the 5th or 6th time- it's one of the theory bits i always go back to... probably because i'm completely sold on most of what it says. and then i went and kept reading 'the bell jar' and i am presently 40 pages from the end. i am drinking a cup of coffee even though it's late enough in the day to make that idea a bad idea. it means i've committed myself to a night of lucid dreaming and highly fitful sleep. and... that's not really entirely bad or unfun when it's friday night anyway. all this reading, all this brain activity, all this swimming underneath the covers, all this ingestion of ideas and words and politics has got me skipping across images and ideas of my own, words of my own, values of my own, and it feels fiery and enormous and swelling and sweeping and energetic. the investigation that becomes inevitable. and more and more i'm thinking of art (or a person) as an evidence room- a collection of evidences: the books in the shelf, the baby teeth in the jewelery box, the music in the back bedroom, the underlined passages of words, the refrigerator magnets, the left over stuffed animals from childhood. all these things. the signifiers. but what do they signify? who? i'm settling on what and not who. i'm settling on an idea that the signifiers are evidence of desire. evidence of loss- the yearning, hoping, coveting, begging, wishing, and craving that create a (true?) portrait of a person's desire. i am not my cd collection and that collection can't be trusted to tell you anything substantial about who i am, what my personality is like, or what my deep values are. but if you take the cd collection and add it to the book collection and add those to my clothes, the pictures in the lip of the mirror, the trinkets on the dresser, the pictures on the wall, the towel on the bathroom floor, the shoes in the hallway, the shoes kicked off right inside the front door, the dish left unwashed, the fragrance of perfume, the stamp collection, the rosary collection, the art collection, etc etc etc... maybe a strange, shifty definition of my desires emerge... as evidenced by all my attractions. just like a flickr account or a tumbler account. a list of images that belie what the person behind the buttons wants for themselves, dreams for themselves, or at least wants you to dream of them as...

these are things i've been thinking about a lot the past couple weeks. this is how i'm thinking of my practice at present. this is why i want to keep a lot of the new work private for awhile. just a bit. just a breath. i am collecting the evidences, i suppose.

side-note: this is my 666th post on this blog. eeewwww.

thinking...

when i was at the gallery last weekend, my director and i talked and talked and talked about process and concept and hope. and at the end of the conversation she said "it's just so wonderful how conceptual your premises are!" and it made me smile because i tend not to think of my practice that way. but i suppose it is. psychological and fragmented and this quest of mine to unify all these seemingly disparate images. they aren't disparate at all. not in the least. and so it's interesting and happy-making: to abstract the idea and not the image. to use realism in this capacity. to redact a book page and hang it next to a big oil painting and say that the two are not disparate. that such a joining makes perfect sense. just the same way a poem is a painting: it is merely the appearance, the form, that is different but that the two function in remarkably similar (if not identical) ways. fraternal twins. genetically identical but unique. it's a freeing way to proceed.

good morning!

it is cold and blue this morning. shivers and frozen breath. the steam coming off the top of my coffee is bright white.

the first thing i saw this morning when i stumbled out of bed was the big oil painting i worked on almost all day yesterday. what a beautiful sight to behold first thing! it's weird- that might seem like a really egotistical thing to say about one's own work but, the maid portraits in particular, feel like other beings to me... like recognizing and appreciating another person's beauty. i don't mean it as a self-congratulation at all. when i look at them i want to just do my best. slow down, listen, be attentive, and move in the direction they point. it's a series of work that comes and goes and works best when i don't try to make them move in a particular direction... actually, all my work is kinda like that. and it isn't intuition so much as trust. a call toward belief. faith almost. a chase.

i need more coffee.

how quickly

i am deep inside one of the maid portraits this morning. oil sliding sliding sliding. i have 3 big canvasses in the final stages that have been waiting patiently for my attention for almost 2 months, breathy sigh and all. i took a long break from my ladies because i realized i was putting too much pressure on them, on myself, to be something they aren't. and so, with all these weeks of drawing, thinking, writing, reading under my belt, i'm seeing them again as they are, as they are meant to be, no pressure, no assumption, no expectation, no ridicule, no mean spirited judgement. and so i go and blend blend blend their skin, their dresses, their aprons. they sigh and whisper under the brush. they bend and nudge and allow their nuances to be found. such love. my lovely ladies. beautiful beautiful.

all better now

back from The Jog and feeling so much better. lighter all the way around. the wild horseradish and roses are flowering and good ol' california poppies everywhere and the rain clouds shoved off without letting go a single drop and we pounded and bounced our way through the warm vineyard, bright green hills all the way around us, and the lovely fragrance of "burn day" floating down from the top.

i finished one of the iceberg drawings, work i want to keep secret for a bit, at least in terms of what it actually looks like. sometimes when i let work out in to the world too soon, a false feeling of finality finds me and it becomes strangely hard to keep working with the image. but i won't keep their faces hidden forever. just a couple weeks. maybe a couple months. i just want to have a more personal and deep experience with them for awhile first. something private where risk becomes an available thing. a necessity even. but right now all i can really think about is LUNCH. i want a big plate of taquitos and beans. i just might have to take off early from work today. :)

grrrr

i've been working on drawings of icebergs all morning and will leave soon to go obey The Almighty Jog before it starts raining and before i slide too far in to a state of agitation. The Jog is just as much about mind maintenance as body maintenance... maybe more so. all that pounding of my heart and hard breathing usher in such an enthusiastic (and relieving) clarity. and lately i've found myself feeling quietly annoyed and more than a bit irritated. mostly with things outside of my control, but also because i've been feeling a very strong pull to make a more concrete plan for my life. actual paths toward my goals and aspirations and it's hard to know where to start. it always comes back to the work, to working everyday and seeing where i end up, what i've done, what i'd like to do, etc, etc, etc. it's just that sometimes the daily grind starts feeling like non-movement. my impatience begins to rear its stupid, meddlesome head and i notice i'm a bit punchy, a bit on edge, a bit fragile in the feelings department. The Almighty Jog alleviates a lot of this and gets me back to a healthier state of mind where i realize (and accept) that deep changes take time, and that big accomplishments are really just a series of small accomplishments all piled up. the daily grind is important. or rather, it's important to make sure that grind is healthy and true to who you are, true to who you're trying to become. effing growing pains.

Ai died and i am broken-hearted.

a powerhouse. a reckoning. she died march 19th. i just found out this morning. my heart got tight as i read the line, the little line, that she had passed. and nothing specific. "62 years old, dies from illness". and my heart breaks. 62 is too young. too too young.

in her honor, one of my favorites...


PROSTITUTE




Husband, for a while, after I shot you,
I don't touch your body,
I just cool it with my paper fan,
the way I used to on hot nights,
as the moon rises, chip of avocado

and finally, too bored to stay any longer,
I search your pockets, finding a few coins.
I slip your hand under my skirt
and rub it against my chili-red skin,
then I put on your black boots.
I stick the gun in my waistband,
two beaded combs in my hair.

I never cost much,
but tonight, with a gun, your boots...






-Ai
from Cruelty

text book

yep. i am the middle child.

be true.

yesterday was glorious and strange and exciting and emotional and full of insights that i was completely ready for- a surge, a sweep of ideas that have been swirling swirling and then wonderful conversations that extended such a forcefully bright clarity that it shook my insides, shook things in to place.

i spent a magnificent hour and a half at the gallery talking about work and process and where my head's at and how i'm choosing images, what i care about, the moral (?) impulse inside art, the cry, the collecting of evidence, art speak art speak art speak; and it was so happy and fun and inspiring! i love visiting my gallery. i love everyone who works there. i love laughing with them and talking shop and making crass jokes.

after i left, i made a subconscious detour and ended up at my old school. i parked and went inside. as soon as i was through the doors, i saw an old school-mate of mine who is now in the masters program there. and lucky for me, he's a talker and likes to tell you everything he's learning and all his thoughts about art and jobs and education. so i stood there and listened and picked his brain for an hour. he gave me the insight i needed, the swift kick in the ass, the hard answer. i don't think he's aware of how completely meaningful and helpful the conversation was. but at one point he asked "do you want to teach?" and i said "well... no, not really but it'd be a lot better than waiting tables. what i really want is to find myself represented by a blue-chip gallery in new york. i've got every cliched, lofty goal in the book, to be totally honest." and he said then to just stop worrying about grad school and focus on The Portfolio. focus on the work, get it done, wrestle with that and that alone. and he's right. i already knew that this was the correct answer. i've known it all along. but finance works its way in to the equation at every turn. insidious and cruel. but i have always been poor and never really had much of a problem with that since i became an adult. i knew when i made the conscious decision to go ahead and nurture the unconscious reality of the fact i'm an artist, that it would spell a lot of struggle and a lot of hardship. i was not deluded about this. ever. and i know that one day, if i keep after the dream, it will change. i must trust myself and i must be true to myself.

after our conversation, i walked through the senior painting studios. i walked passed my old studio. my heart dropped and welled up with such a hurt, painful longing for how my last year in school went. the massive regret over lost time...

i have no clue how i graduated, let alone with high distinction. no clue except for the unconscious drive to BE HERE and DO THIS. i was running running running toward the goal and busting through every single hurdle in front of me and, yes, i lost my mind for a bit afterward, but as i walked through the studios i realized that the simple reason behind that big bad 2 year depression was that i had handed over the life i was trying to create. i realized that somewhere along the line i had handed over control... i thought that's what love was. i thought that's what daughterhood entailed. i thought that's what good people do. when i realized these thoughts were entirely wrong, such a deep deep sorrow and despair spread through me. and as i walked through the studios, the shadow of that sorrow spread over me but, this time, it brought a strange, painful, healthy clarity. the knowledge of who i am and how to trust myself, how to be true to THE PATH...

the answer i came to was, simply, to keep doing what i'm doing. keep reading, keep writing, keep drawing, keep painting, keep playing, keep reaching out to others who appreciate these things, who understand these things, who care, truly care, about these things- people who KNOW the relevance of these practices, these hard hard hard pursuits. i don't want to be anything else than what i am... and so i am charged with finding a way, no matter how long it takes, to build a life for myself that feels right, that feels respectful of who i am, what my loves are, the things i value. i am charged to protect and sacrifice in its honor. i am charged to stand on the foundation of my values and somehow be courageous enough to keep going. to let TIME take time. to let love this enough to be okay with 'the long haul'. all i want in this world, in this life, is to be an artist. to write and to paint. that's it.

i do want to go to grad school but not for professional reasons ie: a job. i want to go for The Work. i want to go for the sake of The Work, My Work, to nurture it, to make it stronger, to take it to a deeper place. that's the reason i went to art school in the first place- The Work needed it. when the work needs it again, it will get it. i will find a way to ensure that the work always gets what it needs.

now, the work needs me to give it as much focus and attention as i can. every single day. read, write, draw. read, write, draw. and trust the whole spinning wheel of the thing. this is what i am built for.

the work i dropped off yesterday will be shipped to New York in a couple weeks for AAF. i will not think about it anymore. i will not have any expectations of the event. i will only enjoy the beautiful sign of support this is. the fact that my gallery believes in me and to rest warm and safe in that knowledge. it is a generous and wonderful thing. i will curl back around my pencil and keep working.

and the desire to write, to be knighted "a writer", is as large a desire in me as to be a painter. i want to send these words out, as flawed as they are, to whomever might be able to used them. i will trust them. fearlessly and ferociously and without apology. this is who i am and i want nothing different.

i think the last few weary trappings of my depression were swept away yesterday. i am ready to get back on the good grey horse.

SATURDAY! YAY!

i allowed myself to sleep in today. it's the big beautiful perk of saturday and i needed to cash in on it big time. i got crappy sleep all week. out of no where my horrible tendency to lay awake all night returned and it made the week long and painful and unhappy. adequate sleep is a magical and lovely thing.

so now, well rested and with newly polished teeth, i'm in an eager and bright mood. it's chilly but sunny and in a little while we'll head out to the city to drop off new work. i love drop-off day at the gallery. LOVE! it's so much fun to sit around and talk shop and make art nerd jokes.

and yesterday, columbia pictures bought this little painting...



mama
6" x 6"
acrylic and graphite on canvas
angela simione, 2009


...as part of the set design for The Smurfs movie! hahahahahahaha! my little painting's gonna be on the big screen! i get such a big kick out of that! awesome!

all this to say- it's a happy, happy day.

happiness is adrenaline

i have a dentist appointment later this morning and then all sorts of running around to do afterward. businessy type things that get my adrenaline moving. it is the business end of this business that lights a fire under my ass in a way that i absolutely appreciate. and tomorrow it will be the same- dropping off 5 of the recent pieces to the gallery :)

having an out-side schedule is a wonderful thing. left to my own devices, which is usually the case, i judge myself too harshly. i think that i'm not doing enough and that, what i have done, is total shit. isn't that just the way it goes. shooooot. ;) but then the business end of things decides it needs attention and it gets me out of my own head to a place where i can see things a bit more clearly, a bit more accurately. a place where i can see i'm not all bad, that every now and then i find myself with a reason to give myself at least a small pat on the back. and so i'm grateful for it.

i'm just at the beginning, poverty stricken and wondering what to do next, and these confirmations arrive that give me the boost i need right when i need it most. and also, this blog. this weird digital land. i get such encouragement and a spreading warmth the longer i maintain this space. i'm just so welled up with gratitude this morning. i'm thankful for everyone who comes here, everyone who gives me a smile and a nod and says 'you're doing alright, kid". so so so thankful. :)

EXACTLY!

went and visited our fair liege, the Radish King, and saw the exquisite picture of Glenn Gould lost in his ecstasy, his deep, dreadful loves, his deep, unseen dreaming- and this is exactly what i mean about learning the little idiosyncrasies of your own practice. the little twists that no one else understands but is so entirely necessary. a tool. a step in the ritual. it cannot be passed by without everything falling flat. maybe it is the cup you always always always take your coffee in? maybe it is a particular notebook to write in? maybe it is a particular time of day or night when it all floods easily and hot? maybe it is a chair?

true story

Gabriel





(all the white daisies in the field all the white daisies go crunch crunch crunch)

by the far fence, the little girl gathered lady bugs. so many her hands were all red. my eyes were big and my heart was full and i thought she would be my most perfect friend. i loved her for her hands. an angel in the wide field. gently gently, collecting and collecting, saving the tiny ruby bodies from the rain. then she smiled at me and said 'watch this' and quick quick she slammed her hands together. RED RED PALMS held up in front of my face. thrown in front of my face. crushed in front of my face, in front of my wide, wide eyes. i ran and my breath was fast and my heart was choked. i heard her giggle, small and pleased. the angel in the far field. i looked back as she bent to the grass and began to collect again.

yawn, stretch, good morning.

i'm having a hard hard time waking up today. at least in terms of feeling energetic. i am worn out! is there such a thing as too much reading???? too much writing???? too much drawing???? i suppose it's possible. there is definitely such a thing as too much thinking (i'm guilty of it more often than not) and all these things are just other modes of thinking so... yeah. but i've got my coffee and another sunny morning so i should be able to shape up here pretty soon. there's a lot of work to be done. i wrote almost all day long yesterday and i'd like to edit for a bit if it's at all possible. usually it seems like it takes a couple of days for me to back up enough to be able to see what's really going on and become detached enough to start sacrificing words, slicing up phrases, and pretending it's someone elses work so i can reek havoc on the thing. but i've also noticed that if i'm not in the fire things start getting watered down. it becomes obvious i'm trying too hard. at least it seems like that to me. when it all comes tumbling out in one jarring bolt is when it ends up being the best lately. and i just read an article about art practice and how individual it is. completely specific, full of quirks and twists; and that it takes a while for an artist to recognize these little habits of theirs as being a source of nourishment to their practice as a whole- whether or not you sit or stand to paint (or write), whether or not you listen to music, talk to your dog, eat breakfast, etc. all these things, these small actions become a part of the ritual. i'm trying to learn how it goes for me. i seem to be in a place where i need to process a lot of ideas and images all at once- that's why so much drawing lately. oil painting takes too long. lots of sitting around literally waiting for paint to dry. and these short bursts of writing too. there's a quickness about it that i really like. it feels true. an immediate demand that is immediately satisfied. no wonder i feel worn out!

anyway, GOOD MORNING!

draft/excerpt/writing practice

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i shout FIRE FIRE FIRE inside myself. i shout it and no one knows. i lay composed and pretty on my side of the bed like a fat, mean infant, in the middle of my own warmth. i lay and the hours glide slow and greasy as hair. my desires go selfish, fueled by the nag, the nag, the shout of FIRE FIRE FIRE. crowded by old heavy pillows, i go hot. the filth of my body trapped in the fibers of its coverings. the filth. my filth. my shame and from my shame selfish desires take shape. my eyes are closed. my face is still. no one knows i shout FIRE FIRE FIRE inside myself. it is silent. the body next to mine has no clue of the FIRE FIRE FIRE. i picture myself laying under a white wedding-knot quilt under tall windows and a high, bright ceiling. i picture myself and in the picture i do not waste time staring at the ceiling. i curl below the wedding-knot, unwed and warm. the white room, the white walls are far from my head. i am not crowded. the walls are clean, open and bright. i gaze at the walls and not out the window. in the white room there is no nag, no need. in the white room there are no curtains. there is nothing to hide. i pull the wedding-knot thick against my throat. my shame bulges. i pull and pull, shame bulging out on all sides, until my throat splits and out it drops, clear as a diamond, clinks and twinkles across the floor. the hot of my body burns itself out and i fall asleep, finally without fire, inside the white room. the white room. easy as a child.

and in the corner, a glittering
white

light lodged.



.

pouring

the graphite scratches and slides.
i put on a new pot of coffee.
i prop the drawing back on my lap.
i press down hard with the pencil.
my legs fall asleep.
the paper is scarred.
the paper is scarred as i am scarred.
i read.
i read, i realize that so much has been kept at bay.
so much kept behind the wall of a smile.
so much fear of embarrassment.
too early was i sneered at and sneered at for crying.
too early i learned that "you are ugly when you cry".
i read and i write and i realize.
the graphite slides.

fuck the eraser.

page after page

i am reading The Bell Jar again. this is round 3. it's been about 2 years since the last time i read it, and 14 or so since the first. when i read it the 2nd time, i didn't remember anything about it other than i remembered liking it when i read it when i was 14 or 15... somewhere around there, the common age for the first time read of this particular work, it seems. HA! and so when i read it again at 27, i was startled by it completely. it unhinged things in me, let long hidden things float to the surface. or come screaming up, tearing up, bleeding to the surface.

the language and the tempo of the book are easy in a lulling kind of way. slowly, slowly, we (i) follow the guide of the words, chapter after chapter, and when the break happens, when the collapse of function occurs inside our heroine, we (i) collapse as well. something unhinges. and in that gap, the text of this book begins to pool.

yesterday i slid back and forth between my graphite pages and the pages of this book. i'd draw for an hour or two and then go read. draw for an hour or so and, again, go read. and then i took a late afternoon jog through the vineyard and noticed spring has arrived. daisies and vultures out everywhere and the thirsty evening clouds of gnats. it was a relief to see these signs of a new season. the waking-up of the land. and when i came home, i made a big dinner, took a shower, and got in bed again with my book. i read until i fell asleep. i don't remember having dreamt. and i woke, sore-eyed, to the aroma of fresh hot coffee.

this day will mirror yesterday in my activities but this strange, daily education and practice is taking shape, clicking in to place, and it simply just feels right. my life contained and expressed and breathing across so many sheets of paper. the soft texture. the mark of graphite. the smudges of type on my thumbs. the gray that shadows up my forearms from drawing and ends eventually on my cheek.

draft/excerpt/writing practice

who are you thinking of?
my father.
what about him?
how i lost him.
how did you lose him?

i'm not really sure anymore. it's happened so many times. i can't even be sure that the first time i lost him is really the first time. i was too young. i might have lost him several times before and not known it. or maybe the word 'lost' is not the right word. but i remember all of a sudden knowing that i didn't have him. it happened when i was 9. the accident happened when i was 9. the accident. the swimming pool. black bottomed. numberless. it was father's day and i was 9 years old and he was 400 miles away. he dove in. he hit the bottom. no numbers to tell him the depth. he dove, high-swanned and streamlined, in to the shallow end. the ground shook, they said. the ground shook. and his body when limp from the crack. from the snapped spine. and he floated there, hanging on at the rim. hanging on, keeping his head above water until the ambulance came. the ambulance and in and out of consciousness. the ambulance. and a phone call. a phone call and the news and mama left to go see him in the hospital. when she came back she had no choices. this is not something a person can hide. she sat us down on the couch and told us that the accident hurt daddy forever. the booboo is too big. it will never heal. she said the word 'quadriplegic' and told us what it meant. she said daddy will never walk again. i said god could fix him, right? she said yes god could. i asked if we could pray to god to fix daddy. she said we could pray.

we went and visited him in the hospital. there was a cage around his head bolted in to his skull. they called it a halo. i was 9 years old and i thought of angels. hope, faith, and charity. those are their names. those are the angels just for children but i asked god to give those angels to dad instead. my daddy was hurt and stuck and closed shut and trapped. the halo and his own body. trapped. and i wanted to break my neck too. they would wheel him out to the patio in his bed, in the halo, stuck, stuck on his side sometimes, they would turn his body for him, stuck, and he would smoke a cigarette with help from the nurse. i smiled and he watched us play. i was 9 and i knew to smile. i knew it was important. and don't stare. it is rude to stare. and it is rude to cry when you aren't the one who fell down. i smiled. i prayed.

my brother and i rode in the wheelchairs there in the day room. the nurses didn't mind. and i said to one of them that i wanted to break my neck too so that dad wouldn't be alone. she didn't say anything. she just smiled at me and put the towels away. she is the only person i told back then.

when we got home, i spent the next year learning how to swan dive. how to jump high and point my entire body straight down. then i started doing it with my eyes closed. i tried to hit the bottom but my instincts made my body pull up. i only managed to hit the bottom once. i hit the bottom and i scraped the side of my face all along the rough floor.

did you get in trouble?
no. i never said what i was trying to do.
was that when you started thinking about death?
no.
when did you?
the year before.
when you were 8?
yes.
explain that to me.
i can't.
try.
not yet.

this day

black graphite all up and down my arms all over my wrists and across my cheek. coffee and icebergs and a television workout, The Bell Jar and Joan Jett.

yes. you.

lately our ideas have been sprawled in the same field. or turning cartwheels. or screaming for attention. or screaming in to a pillow. or kicking our feet, ill-behaved children throwing a temper tantrum, trying trying trying to find a way to say what we're all thinking, what we're all after, and from a thousand different vantage points, a thousand different diamond shards circling our heads and landing in each other's eyes. and sometimes it hurts and sometimes it is beautiful. and so i followed your lead and i went to the used book store yesterday and got my very own copy of The Ravishing of Lol Stein by Marguerite Duras. i was up til midnight. i read the entire thing all in one hot, addicted shot. and instantly i felt such a strange and bonded lineage. i saw the contours of it. i saw that it exists even if i can't name it. maybe the name doesn't matter. and i immediately thought of The Bell Jar and The Piano Teacher. they are sitting side by side in my book case and this book will be slid in next to them. and yes- the easy corollary of insanity- but rather... fragility. how a person is damaged. how deep damage can be. that fragility, that search for the one right word that would explain our damage, make it okay, make it understood. that right word that would erase the shame that follows fragility.

thank you all for referencing these books on your blogs and for bringing Duras to my attention.

:)

i bought new pencils. the blackest they make. the 9 XXB. i am burning through their softness, burning them down to quick stumps. i am in the burning building in a way i haven't been in 2 years. a rapid firing and synapse. movement. that surge. it is addictive. it is such a big joy. such a large, free happiness to be working working working and not worry too much about where the drawings will end up. i'm tired of worrying about the future the way i've been taught to worry about the future. i don't care about the time-lines others say are right. i don't care at all. i'll get there when i get there. or maybe i'll never get there. maybe i'll get side-tracked or maybe i'll decide i want a different thing than we're all taught to want. i've noticed that i'm at my peak performance, at my healthiest, most joyous, fiery state when i just let my practice run wild, run back and forth between all its personalities, and just play along with whomever or whatever shows its face on any given day.

i'm going to go make coffee and get in bed with a book and a drawing. i don't care it's still early. like andy warhol said- everything seems glamorous if you do it in bed.

this poem will be deleted but i want to know if it needs work.

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week 3





first wool
now glass

the pancreas exploded
and every dirty toxin, all filth
seeping through

and Jesus and Jesus
Saint Genevieve
mama, no.


first glass
now wool
and hair falling out in clumps in the cup
of your small hand.


i watch him shave your head in the kitchen.
i watch him sweep up your hair.

wool and glass
through both our eyes, mama

Saint Genevieve, the clear

poison steaming
toward the stable vein.

the arm exploded. the tumor has not changed.

thinking

the drawings below make me hungry for etching...
but alas, i have no print shop at my disposal. i've been thinking a lot about going back to school part-time just to take advantage of the facilities. or maybe i should start thinking about other artist programs? residencies and things like that. the hard part largely (lately) is not being sure where i fit in. and i'd really like to maybe possibly hopefully do something with writing. get a bit involved in the literary world. i have no clue really where to start and feel sort of sheepish about the whole thing. maybe i need to just go for it... build up my "rejection letters" file. i plan on one turning the file in to a coffee table book one day. ha!

yesterday....

ghosts and grey dresses,
apparitions, the cold breeze...





hint (1 and 2)
10" x 22"
mixed media on paper
angela simione, 2010

thank you, corey haim.

a bit more sunshine

also, i wanted to take a moment to thank the blog-o-sphere for not only giving me a space to work out my ideas, but for exposing me to new ideas and perspectives that i might not have stumbled across otherwise. i find myself right smack in the middle of such a wonderful and twisting education as a result. i've found so many thoughtful artists and writers and thinkers. i've been turned on to authors and poets and artists that i didn't know of prior to really attempting to engage in a daily blogging practice. and the more i read and think and wrestle, the more well-rounded i feel... and that feeling is very happy. i've got quite the reading list complied and just feel so thankful that this space we're in, whatever it is, is very much like a classroom. sometimes it gets heated, sometimes arguments erupt, but the struggle itself is good. i feel more and more inspired and excited simply by taking the time to read the thoughts and opinions and research of others. and to all the people who leave comments, whether it be here or on other blogs, i really appreciate your insights too. sometimes a comment spins my entire perspective around and i can see very clearly the thing i've overlooked inside my own thinking. and i'm very thankful for those moments. i think education, in whatever form it comes in, is a wonderful thing. it definitely isn't easy sometimes, especially when a clash of ideals happens, but even those instances give me pause- room to really consider what my personal/artistic philosophy is and where it comes from... and if it needs to be amended. it does need to be challenged ever now and then in order to grow.

i'm choosing to leave my embarrassing posts up for awhile... especially the ones in which my fervor or empathy or passion may have run a bit wild and i turned away from seeing the grey areas of life. i'm leaving them up for now as a way to chart my own learning, my own growth in terms of building a more open mind, a more inclusive set of ideals and approaches to the world. i do truly want to be as compassionate and thoughtful as i possibly can. it's a big priority. sometimes i get really embarrassed over not having all the answers and that's just something i'm going to have to get over. ha!

all this to say- THANK YOU for participating in my education! thank you for writing and commenting and struggling with ideas too. i learn so much from you. :)

:)

the sun is out and it's so bright and beautiful today! yay! it's damn cold though but i'll bundle up and spend as much time outside today as i can. i want spring back so bad and it is well on its way. the mustard is growing wild and tall and gorgeous already. there are orchids and daffodils peaking up at the low line of the forest and birds singing like crazy. it is beautiful. absolutely beautiful. and i talked to my mom this morning and she sounded so good- happy and healthy and it such a happy moment to hear her voice full of appreciation for this world and the simple beauties it contains. she always reminds me of those "small" wonders that are so easily overlooked. i am grateful for the reminder. endlessly. it is a good day and i feel renewed and inspired and content to be just where i am, doing what i do, and i know i am in the exact right place. maybe it's a day to make more moths. lay off the heavy shit for a bit. ha!

geez.

so..... the internet has been a strange and lively land today. specifically in terms of feminism. there are lots of questions about where feminism is going and if its started to crumble and whether or not its turned into a joke.

i think feminism is very necessary. it has never been, in my eyes, a "girls are better than boys" club and i think feminism as a whole needs to stand up in praise of men who stand with us- men who believe that women's perspective and contribution to the world is valid and meaningful and entirely necessary. men who love women is the true sense of the word: a feeling rooted in respect.

yesterday, i received an email from a friend which supplied a link to a breaking news story about a rapist who decided it would be a wonderful thing to carve the word "MINE" in to his victim.

now, just because that makes me want to puke doesn't mean i will look away. feminism, in all its varieties and modes, contains a set of ethics which states that things like this must not be dismissed or avoided. i choose to not look away from this because it is important to let the victim know "I see you. I am here to listen to you." it also supplies me with a deeper appreciation for the good men in my life.

the person who sent me the link is male and was absolutely disgusted and outraged by this. i am thankful for his emotions. i am grateful for his anger. it is an obvious sign that men and women can be on the same team when it comes to hatred and cruelty and that we can share a set of ethics that is as respectful of our differences as our commonalities.

strangeness

the weather is ODD today. intermittently sunny then dreary. and during the dreary times it's hailing! and it ain't no wussy hail either! big fat hail. it's hailing right now for the third time today. pounding the roof and windows, so much that it almost looks like it snowed outside. weird! i love the way it sounds though. love.

HAPPY INTERNATIONAL WOMEN'S DAY!

yay!!!! celebrate!!!! however you can! think about the work of a female artist you admire, learn a bit about their life story, help a female friend accomplish something, listen to another woman's story, sit back and feel calm and accomplished, take a moment to see how far we've come, how far you've come, and be thankful to be part of such an amazing lineage of women (and men) who have pushed the legal, political, and artistic boundaries wide enough to allow the important contributions of women to be seen, honored, and take root.

check out this video

my simple idealism

i guess i'm just in the struggle of the thing...

the heartbreak and confusion of all these horrors and trying to come to terms with them, trying to see what my responsibilities are.

it's easy to feel lost and to forget the wide area of grey that surrounds us.

i just want to find a way to do something good and meaningful with all this stuff. i suppose it will take awhile to find that. and i feel embarrassed by the fact that i have no answers.

a bit further...

i went for a jog and took advantage of the bright sunny day we've received. The Almighty Jog works wonders. it really does. it helps me think. it provides an environment to find clarity. probably all that hard breathing. :)

i think what i'm trying to get at in the post below is that intellectual investigation of violence and victimization become dangerous sometimes... dangerous in terms of inadvertently trivializing the suffering of others. i'm reminded of Susan Sontag's book "Regarding the Pain of Others" and how we have a moral responsibility when it comes to the proliferation or manufacture of images of other people's suffering- whether that representation is of a creative nature or documentary or expository. we may not use these images to speak for the victims and we must be on guard in using specific acts of victimization as metaphors that sensationalize, glamorize, minimize, or trivialize the event itself. to do so is to add a new layer to the victimization that has already occurred. we further the humiliation. and in someways, possibly inadvertently, encourage the outlook that the victim is somehow to blame. it disregards pathos as being a true, accurate state of being.

i am trying currently to merely hold a candle for others. i am not trying to speak on behalf of the victims. i cannot tell their stories for them. what i can do is raise them up so that they are seen... remembered... given a platform from which to scream or cry or whisper... or even forgive. whatever the story, it does inspire hope. whatever the horror, we can be gentle, we can be thoughtful, we can be truly progressive.

wrestling with ideas...

surprisingly, Facebook CAN be good sometimes. i found this quote this morning and it fits so nicely with a lot of the ideas i've been exploring lately. i haven't read this book but i will quickly remedy that. this passage really struck me.

"But I began then to think of time as having a shape, something you could see, like a series of liquid transparencies, one laid on top of another. you don't look back along time but down through it, like water. Sometimes this comes to the surface, sometimes that, sometimes nothing. Nothing goes away."

-Margaret Atwood, from the first page of Cat's Eye


especially the last sentence: Nothing goes away.

i've been thinking a lot about how memory brings The Past in to The Present moment... makes it alive again, lets it operate again... and that the operations of a memory can be just as inexplicable and confusing as the rest of human life and interaction. an overlapping of time. however, i must accept that The Past, even if it is awake in the present, cannot be changed. it cannot be erased or altered. it happened. it is final, in that sense, even if it is active.

and so... finding a way to walk with memories instead of letting them take the lead... finding a way to live with certain knowledges, certain insights, certain wounds, becomes the challenge. and not to scapegoat or become embittered. not to use The Past as a reason to run and hide or to become cruel, become malicious... not to trade places with The Monsters... not to join them.

as i study loss, grief, expressions and states of mourning, i see more and more clearly how sneaky and attractive and (possibly) a natural reaction for The Abused to long to become The Abuser. i see how slippery that particular slope can be. to hurt because you've been hurt...

but that isn't the only choice. no matter how victimized or traumatized a person may have become, it is still not license to become a monster. and i thinking specifically of murders and rapists here. specifically the people who tortured sylvia likens to death.

i watch that show 'Most Evil" a lot- the one where the psychologist explores killers' childhoods and examines the abuse these people generally suffered as a child in order to find a reason for why they became so violent later on in life.

it's very interesting and completely compelling and i think it's such an interesting practice, on the part of the doctor, to make a scientific argument for the existence of evil (a spiritually defined state). but he doesn't excuse it. there are many many many MORE people out there who have suffered in the same ways who do not turn around and react with such extreme violence and hatred toward others.

once you become a monster, you give up the right to the compassion we extend to victims. once you turn the corner and become The Abuser, you no longer get to expect the care and concern we offer to The Abused. because The Abused are the reality of these crimes. they are the mark, the proof, the evidence of another person's malice, hatred, and callousness. they are the people who bear this, who can speak as a witness... and so we must look at them, we must listen to them. or i must. i must because if i only look at the killer, the torturer, the abuser, and i examine their life solely, i will end up finding out that they were too, once, a child who was hurt... and that fact will wake up sympathies and confusions and torments in me that can be used distract me from the fact that they are not that scared child any longer.

they too became adults and made choices. and just as i am not allowed to sit here and blame the realities of my life on other people, and scapegoat my responsibilities on the actions of others, neither are they. if the past is awake in the present, i can have compassion for who these people were as a child, but also indignation and disgust for who they are as adults in the HERE and NOW.

and it could be that ignoring a victim's pain, refusing to hear their story, is a clear path to waking malice inside them. and so all the more reason to look at The Victim. all the more reason to try to understand them, where they are, their feelings, their insights, their knowledge. and i don't mean that as a preventative measure solely, but allowing art, science, and philosophy a set of ethics. all this learning and exploring doesn't matter worth a shit if it isn't beneficial inside daily life... at least at some point. there is absolutely no worth to examining why someone tortured another human being if we are unable to use that knowledge to either stop that cycle or to provide care to those who were made to suffer. i study atrocity in order to develop a deep sense of empathy... in order to be able to listen with my whole being... in order to move beyond fascination. fascination is step 1 in my practice. and not just my art practice but my way of living.

fascination must not be allowed to go so unchecked that we end up rationalizing horror. psychology can explain these horrors but it will never be able to explain them away. it will never erase what was done. it will never make it okay. it will never heal the wounds that we must learn to walk alongside of. it will never undo the pain of atrocity. the past is a FACT that can operate in the present but that isn't a license to do such grievous harm to others. it does not render a person's malice harmless. since when does understanding something turn it in to a positive? or even a neutral? understanding how someone became abusive does not change the fact that they are abusive.

and since we cannot change the past, we must deal with who these people ARE right now this minute. being beat up as a kid can't be used 30 years later to get you off the hook for becoming a monster. think of Hitler. he was once innocent too. he was once a scared and hurt child too. but that doesn't excuse The Holocaust and it definitely doesn't undo the trauma that so many others were subjected to as a result- sheer horror, complete degradations, entirely brutal malice. understanding what made hitler Hitler, doesn't change what happened. it doesn't undo what he did. it doesn't make charlotte delbo any less a victim or any less a survivor.

understanding HOW a person becomes monstrous certainly won't lessen the reality of the amazing state of pain sylvia likens died in.

and it doesn't alter the ripple that is sent out.

i think of the police officers and the detectives and the coroner who had to handle her case. they are traumatized too. and the ripple goes and goes and the story of her life lands in front of my eyes. i feel traumatized by these facts too. it isn't nearly the same degree as the coroner who had to write this stuff down, but it still exists.





i'm worn out now. i get long-winded when i get excited or when i'm trying to figure something out and see where i stand on an issue. more later.

and so it goes...

by late afternoon yesterday, i found myself in a fragile mood. a fragile place. and i grabbed the keys to go lose myself in the throng for a little while. i lost myself looking at clothes at macy's for awhile (didn't buy any but tried a whole bunch of stuff on) and then went and looked at curtains and bedroom stuff at Target. Target traps me and i ended up staying there almost until closing time. i left with a curtain rod and 2 pairs of funky socks. funky socks have always made me happy. especially striped ones. and always knee highs. but on the drive home, i found myself getting tearful and feeling like a scared child. these things creep up unexpectedly sometimes... but they are inevitable. for all of us.

it's just the weight of the past, i suppose.

the weight of the past.

there will always be the big WHY. always the mourning for things that never were or things that left too soon or things that should have never been.

the death of an ideal.

the death of an ideal is a grievous thing. the grief is massive and can span years.

but we (i) can create new dreams to take their places. better dreams, better hopes. most of the time, i think i have an idea of how to set about accomplishing that. some days... not so much. yesterday ended up being that kind of day. but this morning i woke feeling so much better. not scared, not so unsure, not so tangled. i am drinking good coffee and i put up the new curtain rod and curtains. a deep plum. maybe eggplant. a deep, dark, dusty color that is warm and gorgeous.

it's nice to know that things can be deep and dark and be warm and gorgeous as well.

something i read yesterday...

"...The description itself does not reproduce the object, it rather helps us to restage and restate the effort to remember what is lost. The description reminds us how loss acquires meaning and generates recovery- not only of and for the object, but for the one who remembers."

from Unmarked by Peggy Phalen, page 147


All these paintings and drawings are descriptions. And just as the above statement asserts, my "description" of, my portrait of Sylvia Likens will not bring her back.

But the act of drawing her, the act of describing her, even partially, is a way to help me remember her even though I didn't know her. It helps me remember what happened. This act of remembering, this seemingly simple act of drawing her likeness of a sheet of paper, is a gesture toward recovery... not only hers, but mine,

ours.

words words words

i have been reading all day long. ever since i woke up. ALL DAY. and i think i'm just gonna let this train keep rolling.

books make everything matter so much more.

me and inga's voices...

hahahahaha!

The Struggle!

good morning, sunshine! where are you? tucked away behind these heavy clouds, lost behind the puddles. it's okay. stay in bed a little while longer if you must. take another sick-day. i am happy even without a bright, warm morning.

i know i've been repeating myself lately about how good it feels to be working with such ferocity again but it DOES! it really, really does! and i see myself circling back toward ideas i was working with 2 years ago before the big bad depression hit. i'm going back to old ground. higher ground. but all the better now for having struggled. 2 years. geez. i still can't see the entire depth of it but i can see the difference in a normal day NOW vs. a normal day this time last year. all the financial worries heaved on top and what a horrible, depleting fight i was in. but if not for that fight i might not have this current clarity and focus. i definitely don't want to repeat the experience any time soon (it slowed my practice to a trickle) but i'm thankful for the experience and insight it gave me. i'm thankful to have been polished by it in such a way that i become more passionately involved with my practice, that i see the power of images and know how strong, how forceful they are (or can be). the financial difficulties are still a factor but i've learned now to not look at them with such a dire, frenzied eye. the student loan will not break me apart.

as i plod through "of the refrain" (we covered another 6 pages last night before our brains leaked out our ears) and focus on my current drawings, i also have been taking the time to look back at the work i did when i was first dealing with these ideas: fractured identities, the fragments of a personality or history, the splintering, the redaction, the erasure of a person... the idea that LOSS is a major component in identity construction. that we are as much defined or formed by what we do not have, what we've lost, what we've never had, as what we possess. this is not entirely negative or morbid. not at all. i am currently wrestling with the sadder side of these ideas but i also see how these sad things can be translated (or composed/organized/viewed) in such a way as to make an individual more compassionate, more knowledgeable, more engaged with the world as a result of having had the experience of loss. finding a way to translate that experience, to find a means of expressing it in a thoughtful way that, not only, expands what art is or how it can be made or thought about or DO, but also establishes a site of hope, is important. at least it's important to me. and this thoughtfulness about The Image, about Art, about Expressiveness is not necessarily pretty or nice or even angry or shocking. there are so many routes to thoughtfulness and i think, for me, the route to take is a path that is inclusive of not only THEORY but of POETRY... of real-life concerns paired with philosophy and thoughts about justice and beauty. this is the struggle and the challenge i welcome.

my practice wants to be more than just an "i like to draw" mentality. i'm not bashing that mentality but, in a very direct way, that mentality is one that refutes and refuses to accept responsibility for the manufacture and presentation of images. it denies, in a somewhat snide way, that images have power. if images didn't have power there would be no controversy whatsoever over things like pornography or burning crosses or even stomping on a flag. no one would blink an eye if these Images didn't have power, if they didn't carry real-world concerns and connotations and possess the ability to destroy what we value as a culture and as human beings. Religion is, at its most basic level, an IMAGE of how life should be percieved and practiced. and just look at how powerful that image is, in particular. so...

this is why my practice aspires to be more, much much more, than the "i just like to draw" mentality. my practice beats me over the head and screams in my face "EITHER GET ENGAGED OR GO HOME!" i'm not saying every artist needs to think this way or proceed this way. not at all. i'm recognizing a desire and drive and need within myself to at least TRY to participate in that arena. there is a fearlessness in work that comes from that particular stance that i admire. all the artists and writers whose work has ripped out my heart, stitched it back together, and then reinserted it into my body, possess that fearlessness; that belief that Art, that Words, that the Image has relevance and power... and enough power to alter the way we view the world and practice our lives. i know that i have been changed AT MY CORE by the work of certain writers and artists. being exposed to their images and words gave me a new perspective and a new hope. it isn't all cerebral. some of it is emotional. some of it is psychological. some of it is in the body.

somewhere along the line inside my big bad depression, i became fearful of going this route. i was in such a weakened state that i did not trust myself, my instincts, my motives, or even my interests. i didn't trust them because i had somehow convinced myself that they might be wrong and bad and i was AFRAID of the repercussions.

i'm admitting to this because i think a lot of artists struggle this way. i think a lot of us deal with moments when our courage falters, if not altogether dries up and disappears.

i still somehow managed to make images i cared about during that time. i still managed to take some risks. but now, i'm ready to stand my ground again and say "THIS MATTERS" and take whatever consequences may result. in fact, i'm not even thinking of the consequences. i'm not thinking about where a painting may end up once it leaves my home. right now, all i'm thinking of is THE WORK. that is where my allegiance lies. that is where my practice needs to be.

the art i am most attracted to, the work that captivates me and spins me around and makes me dizzy, sometimes to the point of elation, sometimes to the point of nausea, is work that trusts itself- work that is fearless and doesn't shy away from how it might be received by The Outside. it is persistent. it doesn't back down after one angry word. it doesn't go away if a person might be dismissive of it. it stands its ground. it plants its flag. it stakes out a territory. it trusts that there is an audience, a community, or at least listeners, out there.

and so i'm sweeping up the fragments and the splinters and seeing what kind of assemblage results. what kind of lines can be drawn. and i choose to trust this process, this way of thinking and responding to the world. i'm choosing to trust my instincts and to not second-guess them. self-doubt is a nasty motherfucker that must be put to sleep... if not put to death. ;)

YO! CHECK THIS OUT!!!

poet christine hamm is putting together an anthology of works (poems, writings, essays, and visual art) that is inspired by the work of sylvia plath! not her death, her WORK! this is a project that, though it seems extremely timely in terms of recent blogosphere activity, is actually long over due (in my opinion). it's so exciting to see how many people are currently fighting to usher plath's work, skill, and creative prowess in to a place of much deserved and well-earned respect and relevance. i couldn't be more pleased. totally amazing and i hope that everyone out there submits.

here are the submission guidelines

mr. beckett

i couldn't find this piece all in one shot on youtube that wasn't cut short or started late.

this piece is sometimes hard to watch... the exaggeration of the expressions of the mouth. looking away might become necessary every now and then.

part 1




part 2

good morning

last night, while my sweetie played a video game with the sound turned all the way down, i read the first 6 pages of 'of the refrain' by deleuze and guattari aloud to him, to myself. and i went back and forth looking up words and we both laughed at how totally illiterate this writing made us both feel. our vocabularies have been increased by words that we will never ever use in a normal conversation. hahahaha! but the idea, the metaphor, of the refrain is burning inside my head now. a refrain... an art practice. the recurrent ideas and images. repetition. and i looked up "refrain" and saw that, in music, it has an archaic synonym: a "burden". all these words with double meanings... i love them. and the rain kept coming down. the rain keeps coming down. it is a wet world and i found a sound to fit the mood.

first again

today is a strange grey day. the cold has finally set in and the sky never really got light. this first day. this new month. and march is the signal that the new year is not so new. i find myself in the day-to-day but, this march, i am not beaten by it. i worked, back and forth, on karen's second portrait and a large drawing of an iceberg. both will take their time. both endless greys and whites and blacks. both a collection of sly shadows and haunts. both entirely fascinating and my hand is cramped now from drawing all day. pressing hard getting the dark parts as dark as they can go. the house is silent and i listen only to the sounds of the street. the cars and the dogs. the sirens every now and then. i sip my coffee. i shave the pencil. i scratch my eyes. i rub the burn in my shoulder blade.

i've been trying but i can't figure out what song would match this day.