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Jan 31, 2011
Jan 28, 2011
25 years ago today
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Challenger
70" x 60"
oil on canvas
jordan kantor, 2007
i was 5 years old and in kindergarten. we watched take off on the little television. then the explosion. our teacher turned of the television and didn't know how to answer our questions if everyone was okay, was the teacher hurt, will the astronauts be okay? she said "when you get home, ask your parents what just happened and they will explain all the streaks of white in the sky."
when i saw this painting in person at jordan's show a few years back it stole my breath. jordan was a teacher of mine. this is the image, exactly, as it is caught in my memory.
Challenger
70" x 60"
oil on canvas
jordan kantor, 2007
i was 5 years old and in kindergarten. we watched take off on the little television. then the explosion. our teacher turned of the television and didn't know how to answer our questions if everyone was okay, was the teacher hurt, will the astronauts be okay? she said "when you get home, ask your parents what just happened and they will explain all the streaks of white in the sky."
when i saw this painting in person at jordan's show a few years back it stole my breath. jordan was a teacher of mine. this is the image, exactly, as it is caught in my memory.
Jan 27, 2011
Jan 26, 2011
Jan 22, 2011
comfort
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"The same thing which makes Henry indestructible is what makes me indestructible. The core of us is an artist, a writer. And it is our work, by our work, that we reassemble the fragments, re-create wholeness."
The Diary of Anais Nin, page 69
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"The same thing which makes Henry indestructible is what makes me indestructible. The core of us is an artist, a writer. And it is our work, by our work, that we reassemble the fragments, re-create wholeness."
The Diary of Anais Nin, page 69
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Jan 20, 2011
hello
the water is boiling for tea. i am home now. but only for a moment. i am sitting the gallery today.
there is so much to say but i don't have the strength right now to type it all out. and, in a way, there really isn't anything to say at all. i just wanted to signal my return to anyone who might be looking for it and to say i am okay.
this is nothing like i thought it would be.
wednesday january 12th was the day. her 56th birthday was yesterday. did you see the moon? massive and bright. i don't remember ever seeing such an enormous moon ever in my life. a gift for her birthday.
i sleep under a quilt she made now. embroidery and patchwork, all crazy.
come see me today at Slingshot if you're around. i'd really like that.
there is so much to say but i don't have the strength right now to type it all out. and, in a way, there really isn't anything to say at all. i just wanted to signal my return to anyone who might be looking for it and to say i am okay.
this is nothing like i thought it would be.
wednesday january 12th was the day. her 56th birthday was yesterday. did you see the moon? massive and bright. i don't remember ever seeing such an enormous moon ever in my life. a gift for her birthday.
i sleep under a quilt she made now. embroidery and patchwork, all crazy.
come see me today at Slingshot if you're around. i'd really like that.
Jan 8, 2011
Jan 7, 2011
3 days
yesterday morning, before leaving to go watch the gallery, i bought my plane ticket. i have 3 days to wait. 3 days to get as much work finished as i can before going to tennessee to see my mom. it is down to that. this is not a freak-out. it's time. and i can't tell you how bad and sick my heart feels. it's hard to do anything. but i feel so much lighter since buying the ticket and making a plan. in 3 days i can hold her. 3 days. 3 days.
i'll be gone about a week and will spend as much time hugging her and looking at her as i can.
i have buried myself in books and crochet. i am making red roses this time. blood roses maybe. i don't know what they are or what to call them just yet... only that they save me. they hold me together. red roses twisted between my fingers and the novels of Jean Rhys digested one after the other. i'm on 'Quartet' now.
a boy came in the gallery yesterday and spent a long time staring at the Worry Roses. he was maybe 20 or 21. i didn't interrupt him. he pulled a small notepad out of his bag and copied down the information about the piece from the tag on the wall. after awhile, i asked him if he had any questions and he came and sat by me in the enormous window at the front of the gallery. he started talking about the roses and choked on his words when he said: that piece... standing in front of it, i just got so sad. could you tell me about it? his eyes seemed wet and i was so struck by his emotion. a total stranger. what a huge gift that was for me. tremendous.
we sat in the window and talked for about 10 minutes and then he was on his way. we shook hands and smiled at each other. it was a very lucky moment.
Worry Roses (for my mother, for myself)
dimensions variable
300 crochet units
2010
detail
it's weird... the piece doesn't photograph well. it looks so small in these pictures but in real life it's huge. it's enveloping. a big embrace.
i'll be gone about a week and will spend as much time hugging her and looking at her as i can.
i have buried myself in books and crochet. i am making red roses this time. blood roses maybe. i don't know what they are or what to call them just yet... only that they save me. they hold me together. red roses twisted between my fingers and the novels of Jean Rhys digested one after the other. i'm on 'Quartet' now.
a boy came in the gallery yesterday and spent a long time staring at the Worry Roses. he was maybe 20 or 21. i didn't interrupt him. he pulled a small notepad out of his bag and copied down the information about the piece from the tag on the wall. after awhile, i asked him if he had any questions and he came and sat by me in the enormous window at the front of the gallery. he started talking about the roses and choked on his words when he said: that piece... standing in front of it, i just got so sad. could you tell me about it? his eyes seemed wet and i was so struck by his emotion. a total stranger. what a huge gift that was for me. tremendous.
we sat in the window and talked for about 10 minutes and then he was on his way. we shook hands and smiled at each other. it was a very lucky moment.
Worry Roses (for my mother, for myself)
dimensions variable
300 crochet units
2010
detail
it's weird... the piece doesn't photograph well. it looks so small in these pictures but in real life it's huge. it's enveloping. a big embrace.
Jan 6, 2011
Jan 5, 2011
pain
that feeling in your stomach, in your throat- the awful, the fear, the indescribable, unbelievable, unthinkable. my heart crystallizes. the mad hand flings in to the floor like a plate. smash smash smash smash, over and over again, stuck on repeat, a scratch in the seam, my heart dashed to pieces over and over again.
simone weil says we should suffer passively... accept our suffering, let our pain wash over us, that we must not resist it, that we must accept it. she says that in this way we become aware of our humanity, our nearness to God. that it is in such a state that we can at least see the veil that separates ourselves from our Maker. that in this state we do not add to the evil in the world. it is running from pain, resisting the fact of pain, doing whatever we can to stop our pain, that cultivates cruelty.
and in moments of lucidity, of calm, of intellectual poise, i agree. when i have achieved that cool distance, i look back at the pain of life and i agree. i look ahead at all the imaginary hurts that the future contains and i agree. i write let it polish me, oh Lord...
but in the present-tense, in the moment of it, my Ethics and Philosophies come face to face with my human frailty. my human frailty kicks up, rises to the surface, overcomes me... and where i once said i agree, i beg why? it rises up, screaming, NOT YET! NOT YET!
it is the Horror of watching the advance of terminal illness. the Horror of being able to see mortality, to know death is coming. we know it and we can't stop it. every day, every day. and here i am, so far from her. every day, every day, reading while i wait for the dreadful phone call. and just like a child, tempted to turn off my phone so that the call can never come.
i hate this so much.
this morning, i watched the sky change from out my bedroom window. as the it struggles toward dawn, it finds the most lovely shade of cornflower blue. deep and cool. it is a color that has always comforted me. it was the color crayon i used as a child to fill in all our eyes. all of us with the same eyes. all of us with her eyes. our pretty mama. we all match.
time is out of order. all the numbers are mixed up. it isn't supposed to go like this. we should have another 40 years.
simone weil says we should suffer passively... accept our suffering, let our pain wash over us, that we must not resist it, that we must accept it. she says that in this way we become aware of our humanity, our nearness to God. that it is in such a state that we can at least see the veil that separates ourselves from our Maker. that in this state we do not add to the evil in the world. it is running from pain, resisting the fact of pain, doing whatever we can to stop our pain, that cultivates cruelty.
and in moments of lucidity, of calm, of intellectual poise, i agree. when i have achieved that cool distance, i look back at the pain of life and i agree. i look ahead at all the imaginary hurts that the future contains and i agree. i write let it polish me, oh Lord...
but in the present-tense, in the moment of it, my Ethics and Philosophies come face to face with my human frailty. my human frailty kicks up, rises to the surface, overcomes me... and where i once said i agree, i beg why? it rises up, screaming, NOT YET! NOT YET!
it is the Horror of watching the advance of terminal illness. the Horror of being able to see mortality, to know death is coming. we know it and we can't stop it. every day, every day. and here i am, so far from her. every day, every day, reading while i wait for the dreadful phone call. and just like a child, tempted to turn off my phone so that the call can never come.
i hate this so much.
this morning, i watched the sky change from out my bedroom window. as the it struggles toward dawn, it finds the most lovely shade of cornflower blue. deep and cool. it is a color that has always comforted me. it was the color crayon i used as a child to fill in all our eyes. all of us with the same eyes. all of us with her eyes. our pretty mama. we all match.
time is out of order. all the numbers are mixed up. it isn't supposed to go like this. we should have another 40 years.
Jan 4, 2011
auto-
finally, the sun comes out. freezing cold but at least there is light. and i am lightened as a result. in bed, drinking tea, reading all day below three thick quilts, finding myself in the lines of another. first, Good Morning, Midnight and now Voyage in the Dark...
the ease of her speech jabs me in the heart, calls me home. there is something to it, this simplicity (that is anything but simple) that corrals the wild sparks of the Past, lines them up, arranges them by height, finally making sense (or at least a site of understanding) of the life that has found me.
the ease of her speech jabs me in the heart, calls me home. there is something to it, this simplicity (that is anything but simple) that corrals the wild sparks of the Past, lines them up, arranges them by height, finally making sense (or at least a site of understanding) of the life that has found me.
Jan 3, 2011
staring
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this blog was meant to be about art.
i don't think it was ever just about art, in the object sense of the word.
i don't think i've ever talked about art in a way that is isolated, separate from my life, my daily windings.
the deaths we withstand. the quake of it. the longing.
this blog will be about living.
what happens when a girl loses her titles.
the transitions. the slippages. the shudders.
a status of absence.
a Non-Daughter.
i told my friend the other day: my life oscillates between Magical and Horrible.
i think it might be like that for a lot of people.
a hunting we will go.
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.
this blog was meant to be about art.
i don't think it was ever just about art, in the object sense of the word.
i don't think i've ever talked about art in a way that is isolated, separate from my life, my daily windings.
the deaths we withstand. the quake of it. the longing.
this blog will be about living.
what happens when a girl loses her titles.
the transitions. the slippages. the shudders.
a status of absence.
a Non-Daughter.
i told my friend the other day: my life oscillates between Magical and Horrible.
i think it might be like that for a lot of people.
a hunting we will go.
.
Jan 1, 2011
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