Should or be in the present

Technically speaking I should be on a KLM flight to Italy right now, en route to "drawing is everything and everything is drawing?" course in Tuscany.

Instead, I'm in Brooklyn, NY, fresh from the bar and sitting with very mixed emotions.

I find myself so much more full of self doubt when I'm in New York than when I'm in any other part of the world.
I miss seeing the world laterally.
I don't like all these tall buildings!

Is New York really just about selling one's work and not making one's work?
I miss the countryside so much...

Architects for Humanity

Settling in...unsettling

I'm trying to ground myself in the experience.

There are other things pulling me in various directions, --There is some work up now from all students (in various years in the program.) In itself the theory behind the graduate program has less of an institutionalized mentality although the feel, space and architecture all speaks of colonial america, but the stress is on practice and process. What is missing for me is a quality to that process and the practice of that.

Makes me want to research quality- roots. Also what it means- is it a expression of a higher consciousness? is it an concept originated from the mind of a 'master' and the connotations to that?

Seeing lots of slides- not many that i am excited by- hoping the faculty lectures will generate more. My camera is in disarray and unfortunately I am not able to document for now. I will have some audio! We'll see what comes.

First full Residency Day, some wasted moments

Meetings-
paperwork, lots
charts
names
dates and times

hung work (Moments with transfers coming off, plus a pedestal lying down adjacent to the wall and transfers come off onto that as well)

can't but compare the experience to workshops- and what I miss about them. this although similar in format, small intimate group- is so different:

The intention, 'how' is there but the implementation of it is not followed through to the depth that I am use to -

We are so spoiled in the education we have had and now I expect that when I enter a space with a 'teacher'.

(will keep reflecting as the process unfolds.)

Montpelier is lovely- you should come up when you get a chance, I am here until the 3rd.

I'll also be in the air coming back from the west coast to NYC.
Come and visit when you are in Vermont...or can you have visitors at the Residency?
I'd love to be out of the city as much as possible for the next ... I mean forever.
Let me know,
fly safe,
A

'thinking BIG' or broader perspective, and Microscosmos

is kind of what is wrong with this consumer culture. Is it not? The last conversation I read from Gablik's "Conversations before the end of time" was about the way we cannot continue with the way industrial society's mind set and the consumption that goes with it.

In suburbia here every park we go visit has a parking lot full of vans. (Of course mother's need space- but really how mush space? How much stuff can one really take along to the playground?) And as we walk bigger and even BIGGER buildings are being built to sustain the bigger and ever growing MICROSOFT. The growth cannot be forever exponential. The curve swings the other way naturally. But I do feel like we have to live each moment conscientiously for every act, thought leads to something. What is that 'something' that we really want?

Let me know more about what they wanted from Meaning, Cleaning. I am participating in two small works shows; scraps are off to Toronto while the eggs are being shipped to New Jersey. Now to pack up the family and work for my first residency in Vermont- we will be in the air this Wednesday! I will try to record, reflect on the experience here. Off to read "Playing and Reality" by Winnicott.

And it's really one simple thing that one works on one's whole life.
Only one.

Reject/accept

I reject the notion of my last post "angry for no reason".
I know what the source of my anger is, and have decided to move it on, to transform it.

I didn't study all these years to give up on emotional outbursts now.
I didn't go to Cape Town and have major breakthroughs to not communicate clearly and responsibly now.

I received a follow up call for our Meaning Cleaning proposal from the curator at AIOP, who recommended "thinking BIG" for our performances in October.

I finally called my collab partner back and took things one step further.
I spoke about participation and putting one's energy into one's work, and bringing magic back into my life (in a real way).

I feel like I'm back.
I'm not "angry for no reason"...and I'm choosing to move that energy forward and transform it into something positive and meaningful.

angry for no reason.

scraps escaping

The Futility of Thinking One Is Ever In Control

Sunday

I spent the weekend in San Francisco, which was quite nice.

Yesterday I found out that my collaborative proposal with Hayley Severns (MeaningCleaning) got accepted by Art In Odd Places for their Pedestrian exhibition in the Meatpacking district in NYC this October.

Details to follow, but it was gratifying that our proposal was among the ones chosen for this year's exhibition.

I walked around a lot too, and marveled at the city's beauty. It also struck me how the place looked exactly the same since I last visited:

the same shops are still around (a welcome change from the seemingly constant flux of "newness" back home);
the same people with dogs are still on Haight street asking for change;
the buildings are still clean;
the city still doesn't have billboards anywhere or massively tall buildings anywhere except for downtown;
one can still have an affordable lunch in a restaurant;
one can still see the sky;
one still can't turn left on Market street (anywhere!);
there are still vintage cars everywhere;
there are still drum circles everywhere;
there are 7 million fewer people in San Francisco than there are in New York City.

The lack of population was my biggest refreshment.
The lack of a constant police presence was my second.

We went to a local art opening in the Mission last night. The work was mediocre, but the scene was pretty positive. We sat outside and flirted with people a they streamed in and out.

Today we did some work in the morning, and then went to a flea market on Alemany; I bought some old photographs of men in "pudica" reposes from the 1940's, and one of a young jockey on a bucking horse (rider is androgynous).
It was windy.
I also bought a journal and resin from an art store on Van Ness.

The rest of the day was spent in Golden Gate park enjoying an atypically sunny and warm day. It was pretty perfect. I felt happy and content, but also admittedly a little anxious for no reason.

We drove back to Sonoma this evening, feeling overwhelmed by "the big city" and yet not quite belonging to this countryside either. This in-between space is new, and I find myself comfortable in it. We just went out to eat. I'll finish this to get back to The Scarlet Letter before I intervene on it tomorrow and cut it all up.

Friday

scarlet letter
heart palpations
waiting for others
breathing and then not breathing
made up problems
art history
the weekend
spec of dust in the universe
the 4th dimension
am I dyslexic?
way too caffinated

I found two copies of The Scarlett Letter today at a thrift store in Petaluma on the way back from a lovely drive from Tomales.
I can't wait to start my intervention on it in the morning.
Heading down to SF tomorrow and I don't know what to expect.
Maybe galleries, maybe museums, maybe adventure.

I just came back from a Rauschenberg and Johns show right here in Sonoma. Who knew this quaint little town could host such a great show? It was such a nice relief. The Sonoma Valley Museum of Art used to be a furniture store, and the town converted it into a museum. I'm so glad it's not the other way around.

I wish I thought of this...I love it.

Absorbed in thoughts

clean the studio, house, mind
need to get out of my own mental structure
received a suggestion to juice- automatically my mind went to the waste of fibers left over, but is it perhaps the way to be- if we drank just the nectar of things? would the body be left to work on other things rather than digestion? what would those possibilities be?
eating more veggies but still eating everything else as well

finishing work in order to move it out of my space- clear clutter
eggs off to New Jersey
scraps to Toronto


grad prep
financial aid-trying to live without/as low as possible loan- wish to finance tuition through grants
need to finish, books work, pack

with Alenka lots of bicycle rides to the park and lake trying not to get wrapped up in 'educating' her- trying more for experiencing life with her she is off to 'school' in September- fears and anticipation of the event (as well as excitement)

studio time

Interesting what "studio time" can mean now that I've given up the space I used to call by the name "studio".

I'm interested in picking up where I left off; the ideas are still so fresh in my mind from years ago, months ago, I'm curious to make all the things I've had on pause for the last two years.

yay!

another list

Salt, as corrosive and preservative (conceptual material)
women's work
the hand held
the hand made
bridal/bridle
etymology of Pudica
peeling back the layers
breathing room
social justice
beauty
intervention

Hope for the Flowers

A favorite book, re-found and bought for fifty cents yesterday at a thrift store in town.

yay.

another path

It's been calming to be in the countryside these last two weeks.
I feel like myself again, but in a new way; the spiral has come around, but now I'm above the last point relating to it from a new perspective.



I am in a place to really think about the next few years of my life, and thankfully am in a position to choose where I want to live...and more importantly how I want to live.



I feel as connected to a coastal town with 99 families as I do to a major metropolis with 8 million families. I guess I always did.

I also know it's easy to fall in love with a location that is the complete opposite of one's chosen locale, especially when work, paying bills, and the multiple tasks of life aren't in the picture.

But why couldn't this be a new picture?
Why couldn't I make my art and life here?
Why should any separation continue?
Why is there any separation at all?
It's beginning to rapidly dissolve...

salt

Salt is a corrosive
Salt is a preservative

What thoughts and ideas are also both?
What mental structures have we inherited that both corrode new ways of relating to the world, and have been preserved over time?