ladyparts

Hold On (I’m Nervous)

I have made a habit of not wanting to look at my art pieces once they are finished or have not turned out as planned. Which is kind of depressing and has to do with not wanting people to see them and also has to with not having places to put them up. They don’t really comfort me like they do for some people, they more remind me that I need to me making something new and pushing myself further. If for no other reason, I must push myself to confront the issue.

So, I had to go and pick up some of my pieces today. I want to share them with you because I really wanted people to see them. The final critique was only three people and felt strange. I have promised to share what I’m working on with you, let’s start here and begin to locate ourselves.

This is a project that I did for Ceramics III this past spring. It is called “Hold On.”

The first (best) step was making the mold. I lay down on my back with straws in my nose, covered my eyebrows and eyelashes with petroleum jelly, cut a hole in a trash bag and poked my face through. Next, my teacher poured mixed plaster onto my face and I lay there, pounds of chemical-reactive pressure on my face. Once I got past the initial fear of my nose-holes filling up, it was really nice just to relax in the solitary weight. After ten or twenty minutes I had people help me sit up while I held the weight it my hands and began to try and pry it off my face. My skin was fire red and hairless. All the other students just stared at me like I was on fire. I felt magnificent.

Unfortunately, the results of the mold, because of the pressure, made me look dead. The first face I made was very surreal. I could fit my face into the back or kiss my own eye. I loved it.

The project went through many phases and the process took me a little over three months to create. They are made from B’s Mix white clay slip. Even now, they did not come out as I had hoped. The firing turned the tin-violet stain that normally comes out purple-pink, into green.

As you can see the result looks somewhat like bruises. I had wanted the faces to look lively. The hand prints to be symbols of heat and contact. Love.

In full installation, the viewer would approach the face and touch it while simultaneously listening to this audio piece.

I am still playing with some ideas of using the mold with different materials, like hard candy or other decomposable material. It will be something that makes it irresistible to contact with one of the senses.

Cockroaches

I didn’t mind them at all, I mean, I didn’t even notice them. But, this was before. Before the gemstone dimensions and decay of stirring, stirring surfaces.

We have at least three different kinds: long honey-colored thin ones, sort of rounder dark brown ones, and very geometric brown ones that are in between the previously descrbed kinds. I wonder if they feel different from eachother. From me.

I am believe in coexistance. I have a lot of trouble killing [insects], on accident or on purpose. I think about all the things that truly inspire me to create an environment of admiration and gratitude, Gandhi and veganism, the face and I just feel overwhelmed. Who am I?

But something about the way they move now, how fast and abrasive. There are so many all over my body and moving on the walls and vibrating along the carpet, in the refrigerator, dropping on my legs at the table. I get back to work after lunch and a baby one is crawling on my pants. I feel frightened, the sheer number. It is terrifying.

I am waiting for the tiny moth to rest on my one-ton-bell self. I am waiting for the hinge to spread open.

Sometimes I think it’s just for the loneliness. We can learn so much from silence.

I wish we weren’t so different. I wish I could understand their sounds and determination. I wish I could look them in the eyes or something equivalent. Without that I just feel like they are taking advantage of me and crawling into my body as I undress.

But I know that there is something very profound about the expansion and detachment. We live so close but are so different. impermeable. Health is more important than saving their lives. What does that mean? Why is the solution to leave each other and to never look back? With no common currency/language/etc., how do we connect?

Is it possible to create something?
Why do insects seem so much different from animals, whom we do connect with?

Perhaps it is The Face.

Evaluation

I’m going to be honest with you, you know, come clean on some issues. I feel pretty weird about how unfocused this blog is. Sometimes it really bums me out. But on the other hand it thrills me.

I was in bed reading this morning, which lead to laying, eyes closed, with a finger holding the page. And I became entirely aware.

It was like I was diving. Forever. Or like there was a powerful force leading me, an anchor. I wanted to write, but I wasn’t sure if I could ever exit this place. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to. I imagine this is what it feels like when you are in space or the depths of the ocean, deeply moved and silenced, yet driven. Focused. Aware. I stayed like this for some time.
The reason I tell you this is that I did get up. I did walk to get my computer. And I thought, “Yes, telling the truth is the anchor, pulling.” Even if it seems or even it is fragmented, I will always meet you here to tell you something really true.

I hope you will not mistake truth for fact. I hope you know that the truth is an idea, a word, involving several elements coming together, pressing against each other with their tender skins. We’ll never really get there, cause it’s pretty much impossible, intangible. But the truth (see previous description) is, I really love pressing against you. I can’t help myself.

This One’s on the House

Today my mom sent me the tiniest video of my tiny brother who is not so tiny now. It is my gift to you, I hope we can be friends. It’s been a while since we last talked, but I really miss you and I have ALOT of tricks up my sleeves. Yeah, both of them. I am ready to take it to the streets (internets) and give it to the people. Can you feel me? We are going places and I really do mean the “we” part. I am going to need you for some stuff pretty soon.

Man, I got distracted and I forgot about the gift.
So here it is:

June 7, 2007

I just realized that writing my senior seminar paper is almost entirely parallel to one of the most embarrassing moments of my life. Hear me out.

It was my first year of college, I was hanging out in the hallway outside all of my new friend’s rooms. And someone complemented me on my shoes. My irrational enthusiasm led to me talking about how Birkenstocks are named after geographical regions.

And then it happened, “These are named Gizeh, wherever that is!?!?!”

Silence.

These were not just any friends; these were the elite, handpicked, honors students who scored 1580 on their SATs. My friend Laura said, hesitantly, “The great pyramids of Gizeh,” emphases on the great pyramids, which lead to almost silencing the Gizeh, as if to ring, some bell inside my soul. I think she really hoped I didn’t mean it. I felt sorry that I did. I meant it; in that god-forsaken moment, I truly had no idea where Gizeh was. All I knew was how much I loved those shoes. They brought me to a new plane of awareness. Enlightenment even. The thought of representation had never occurred to me. I had never even noticed their Egyptian look. Someone mercifully changed to subject.

I later called Matthew. I think he felt bad for me too, or maybe just wished I had thought before I said it.

Ok, so here is the cast:
“Wherever that is?!?!”: the point behind my paper
Me: Me
Friends: Reader
Matthew: Professor

This paper/dissertation/deliberation will be presented and may or may not result in my point coming across as me trying to resound within my readers, but they are wishing that I were better than I am, and my professor knowing that I am better than what has been articulated in the paper.

Truly Outrageous

This is Jem.

Remix.

When I lived in Scotland I was obsessed with Kylie Minogue, and consequently Neighbours. And then there was Jem and her mind-blowing holograms.

I still have the books.

Hypothetical Invitation

Check it:

If a certain “artist” needed you, would you be willing to participate in one or multiple projects?

Before you answer, consider that participants must be very good at following directions and articulating their experiences in an honest, provocative, or explicit way. You can’t just say yes and not put out. Okay, that was a little forward. Sorry.

But seriously, the “artist” has promised that it will be C O L O S S A L. I am not sure if we can believe them, because they may or may not exist, but, I for one am intrigued by their elusive nature. Or bothered.

What I’m trying to say is, think about it.

If you are nervous, leave a comment.

If not, send your address here.

Note: Although this may not be your last chance, if you respond now, you may receive exclusive privileges or favors. Yes, that kind. If you have clicked on Aaron’s photo you obviously know what I’m talking about.

Brother

There is this line in Milan Kundera’s book The Unberable Lightness of Being that, although articulates something very specific to girlhood, was also written for you, my dear brother. It is not even because it explains any speficic action that you do. It is a feeling. The same place in my body where this quote lives, you live. The utter truth and heaviness of our existence is perhaps allowed to exhale when an accurate metaphor is released into the atomosphere.

Sidenote: “He” refers to Tereza and Tomas’ dog, Karenin, which I think is important to understand going into it.

“He would never understand how she stood in front of the mirror as a young girl and tried to see her soul though her body.”

This quote may or may not be accurate considering someone has borrowed my book without my permission and not returned it. But you get the idea, I have a pretty good memory.

So, this may be a very strange tribute to you on the day of your birth. But what I am trying to say is that I love you, you can do anything with your pure and heavy heart. If I could encrypt a message or cue some sort of whisper in your skin I would say, “you are your best self.” And I would mean it.

Every time I think of you, it makes me want to cry. You live somewhere very beautiful inside of me. Thank you for being a part of my whole life.

And most importantly: thank you for the slow jams.