good morning, sunshine!

i am back to my early morning schedule, back on that good, grey horse and OH how i have missed it! i had slipped back in to an old routine the past few weeks and i knew at the time that it was no good. no good at all. i saw how, even here on the blog, i suffered. my lethargy dictating when i wrote and how i wrote. it was glaring and it made me feel bad. but i suppose i needed a little reminder of how good the early morning schedule is for me in spite of being a night person by nature. i've always loved staying up late but i've realized that it's mainly due to the conversations that have taken place in the wee hours- for some odd reason our words seem more romantic, more poignant, more whatever in the witching hour. i've decided that that's sorta teenage (in a bad way) and that i need to out-grow that... at least in terms of day to day living. besides, i know exactly who i picked that habit up from and it's time to set that down. the cleaning spree i'm on is really about me more than the house. much more. and in a lot of strange, hard to explain ways, it is a very deep, very private form of painting, of poetry.

the arts are often used as therapy. here, i am reversing that equation. therapy becomes art. it exceeds and excels its station, its title, its function. i am reaching back in to the corners and getting out all the dust, getting the hair up from the carpet, no inch escaping my notice or hand. everything is touched, considered, fixed, cleaned, put in its right place or shoved out the door. i am trying to get back to that place of newness where all my possessions could fit in two suitcases. this is a romantic fascination that will never happen- my books alone could fill ten easily. but its the desire that is the point. its the work that is the point. a very private practice that will only bring good. there are things that i am finally strong enough to let go of. there are things that i am finally strong enough to live without. there are things that i no longer have any interest in using as a way to define myself.

i cleaned all day yesterday. all day. and i finished one of the potholders. ha! i can't tell you how damn proud i am of that thing! i noticed that i don't use my skills to benefit my own home. all the stuff i make gets sent out in to the world- which is wonderful! that's where art works its magic. but i decided i needed a bit of magic for myself as well... and more art on my walls than just my own. yesterday i framed other people's art and today i'll try to rearrange the walls and get them up. today, i will continue the magic that swirled through my home yesterday. today will be exactly the same. i can't tell you how happy and excited i am to finally be doing this. it has taken a long, pained year to get to this point where i am finally able to unload all of this. i am finally returning to my strong self and i am smiling and hopeful and back on the good, grey horse.

Anonymous Landscape 1

10" x 10"
oil on canvas
2008

my fascination with the collective human urge to protect, stake claims, and establish ownership has led me to consider land and our feelings toward it. recently, my friend heather and i were discussing the native american outlook on land ownership: that it makes no sense. how does one come to own land? it's the same as stating one can own the air - something free and shared by all. how tragically opposite this outlook is to the american perception of ownership.

i've also been thinking about land as a classified document in and of itself - it hides its history. when we look out at a landscape, the events that have taken place within its boarders are not at all apparent. trees and tall grass can erase the signs of war, and leave us with no signal of its true past. bearing this in mind, putting a fence around that landscape seems redundant - we'll never know what secrets the land keeps.

it is our fear that drives the desire to stake claims and put up fences: stranger danger. we're afraid our neighbors will take what we've worked for... and why not? the history of the world is full of conquest, pillaging, taking. we've shown each other that none of us can be trusted. is that cynical? or is it true? finding answers to these questions is what my practice is trying to uncover. i'm trying to show that, just as easily as we put up fences around a house or farm, we put up frnces around ourselves. we lock each other out. we wait to hear unknowable passwords instead of extending trust or compassion.

i'm trying to see what we've lost in order to know where to go.

Present Perfect- collaborative works by eddie gesso and Analisa Goodin

If you're anywhere near San Francisco and have an affinity for conceptual art, I highly recommend stopping by The Spare Room Project to catch the closing reception for Present Perfect, a show of collaborative works by eddie gesso and Analisa Goodin. I went to the opening and had a wonderful time and, honestly, the work is worth seeing more than once. I was stunned by the austere beauty of the installation, the thoughtfulness (and seriousness) of the work, and tried not to cry in public when I realized that I was one of the artists who were mentioned as an influence.

here's the press release:





Present Perfect.
collaborative works by eddie gesso and Analisa Goodin
at THE SPARE ROOM PROJECT

Inspiration provided by the following artists (working): Sophie Calle, Rosenclaire, Léonie Guyer, Harmony Hammond, Eva Hesse, Roni Horn, Agnes Martin, Alfred de Musset, Robert Rauschenberg, Leah Rosenberg, Sappho, Angela Simione, Hadi Tabatabai, and Félix González-Torres.

Opening reception Friday, August 29th, 7-10pm
Closing Reception Friday, September 12th, 7-10pm
The Spare Room Project is conveniently located at
270 Anderson Street,
San Francisco, CA 94110 (in Bernal Heights)

The gallery is opened to the public by appointment only for viewing through September12th.


Present perfect examines temporality through a collaborative effort between two artists, and three temporal delineations: present, past, and future.

It is an abstract exploration into the translation of meaning through time. Present perfect is a grammatical term which illustrates a complex relationship between time and desire—it pushes the temporal boundaries of past present and future into each other. Everything we had said will have made perfect sense is one example of language as a manipulation of time in order to bend desire, wantingness, and expectation for a future outcome.

Failures in communication and slippages in the reception of language are our starting point for this exploration. Stretching the logic of language, and subverting its own rules into absurd structures offer a glimpse into the motivations behind our speak. We want to have been understood.

The Spare Room Project was initiated by a desire for more creative experimentation, more space for emerging artists to fulfill both physical and curatorial ideas, and the tight quarters that San Francisco allots the majority of us. SRP aspires to allow artists in the local community opportunities and exposure often reserved through more rigid tradition, and it hopes doing so will foster otherwise unrealized innovation, exploration, and growth. Through exhibitions, workshops, and group critiques, it serves as a vehicle for teaching, learning, communicating, and sharing.

The Spare Room Project is funded by The Alternative Exposure Grant Program through Southern Exposure.

Mrs. X

i'm still working with ideas of anonymity and social expectations. i've been thinking about the little we know about the lives of women historically. when reading history, i'm always struck by the fact that the lives of women are spoken about with sweeping generalities, as if each woman lived the same life (with differences depending on class).

we can assume that Mrs. X cleaned the house, cooked the food, raised the children, made clothing, knitted blankets, and decorated the home.... but what else? unless i get my hands on a sordid tell-all memoir, i'll never know what life was like for women in passed eras.

i only recently found out that my grandmother sold pies to help supplement the family income. as legend has it, people came from miles around to get one of her delicious apple pies. when my mother told me this story, i was so proud. In addition to maintaining the home and raising 5 children, she did what she could to help financially.

My own mother worked two jobs for the majority of my sister and i's upbringing and still found time to cook dinner and do the laundry.... and stayed up all night sewing our Halloween costumes or making us dresses.

i started thinking about crafting as being very much like the landscape... they both hide their history. just as it is impossible to know what atrocities had happened on a battlefield simply by looking at it, it is equally as impossible to look at a sweater or table-runner your mother made and know what stress or hardship was sitting in her hands while she stitched those beautiful objects together.

anyone who knows how to crochet (or knit, sew, cross stitch, etc), knows what a time-consuming process it is. it isn't mere hours that are spent; it is days or weeks until a project reaches completion. while working on this project, i wondered what worries were going through the minds of our mothers and grandmothers while they stayed awake at night making clothes for their children? what if those worries were apparent in the items they crafted? it would be a sweater few would wear.

so, the woman in this portrait is as anonymous as the crocheted boarder that frames her. their histories are hidden, they are made beautiful for display, perfectly put together.

thankfully, this is not the case anymore. the history of women is now being recorded... if not for the struggles of the passed generations of women. this piece is not based in nostalgia. i used an oval canvas, sepia tones and gold paint, and an ornate, black frame (rendered in crochet) to reference a bygone era. i painted it with respect, and in sadness, for all the women i'll never read about, with gratitude for those Halloween costumes my mom made for me, and for the identity-struggle that is still going on today. even now, many women find it hard to talk about certain things, or in a certain way, in the company of men for fear of being labeled a nag or bitch, or worse... a feminist. we continue to over-edit our speech and discredit our emotions in front of the opposite sex. in short, we hide our identities. we are very much like that landscape... by just looking, no one sees the battle.