Ugh.

I think I know what I'm thinking, but I probably have no idea what I'm thinking. Focus is temporarily M.I.A., feeling like I'm existing outside of myself. Loving it and hating it all at the same time. Walking on cloud nine one minute, and then falling into this deep trench of fear and doubt the next. Why must one always accompany the other?

You give me fucking goosebumps. Just looking at you gives me goosebumps. It's incredible, and it also terrifies me.

I'm trouble.

And you're trouble.

Scratch that, you're a complete psycho and a whore.

You.

Are exquisite.

GAHHHH

I can't even make myself do anything except

sit here

thinking about all the other things I could and should be doing

and that makes me feel even worse

so I continue to do nothing but feel awful

and sit

and stare at the wall, or ceiling

and my body just allows this to happen, and maybe even ENCOURAGES IT?!

It like. Hurts to move. Just as it hurts to pity myself for not being... better than this.

And the logical thing to do would be to compromise - body and mind need give a little to get a little.

But NEITHER is budging! And thus, continuing this cycle of sad and tired and sad. Body cushioning these kind of debilitating feelings of loss and GUILT. I FEEL GUILTY ALL OF THE TIME.

REAL. NOT REAL.

To whom it may concern, (but mostly GD and Illustration) -

Please stop taking the hand out of art. Stop taking the paint out of painting. Stop taking the chance out of drawing from life, the accidents from mark making, the actual MATERIALISM of a work in itself! DIGITIZING EVERYTHING SEEMS SO... NOT OKAY. Digital "painting"? News flash - it doesn't actually exist. There is not paint or brush involved, no canvas, therefor, it has no solidity. Stop pretending it's something it isn't and call it something else. There is nothing more unnerving to me than seeing a peer in a Life-drawing or a painting class, "drawing" on their macbooks using photoshop and a tablet pen. The idea of being able to click "undo" and "lock layers" and adjust transparencies, saturation, and "brush/stroke width" (!?) rubs me in the worst way. "Brush" and "Stroke" width - cracks me up.

I apologize. I KNOW how ridiculously old fashioned I am. I am one with my Olde-Timey aesthetic. But seriously - Let's see some realness. "Realness", that doesn't even sound like a word - I was genuinely shocked that spellcheck didn't call me out on it.

And to ffffound.com, please post more art and less GD :( the type faces aren't particularly interesting (accept for those fancy wood type specimens, those were pretty nice.) and honestly the flatness is bogging me down.

Best,

Julie

"A man has one rib less than a woman, on the left side."

I'm currently reading excerpts from "The Craftsman's Handbook" by Cennino d'Andrea Cennini for Italian Renaissance Thought and Art. Cennini was an Italian painter who's "how-to" book was widely circulated throughout the 15th Century. As an artist, Cennini himself, honestly, wasn't a huge deal. But nevertheless, the guy knows his stuff. I'm strangely fascinated by how deliberate Italian Renaissance painters were in all that they did. Everything served a purpose. They were mindful of their materials, of their masters, of their every move, every decision, every idea, etc. And while their beliefs are almost entirely different from my own, the respect I have for the artists of the time is unmeasurable. A painter was of noble character. Exalted by his reverence for God. He who wished to enter into this profession did so with enthusiasm, reverence, obedience, and constancy. You had to be willing to submit yourself entirely, under the direction of your master. Your master would serve as your mentor and would set an example of what you wish to achieve under his counsel. I realize all of this must sound so rigid, but it wasn't (and isn't) completely.... rigid. The artist, Cennini explains, is like a poet in that he is free to compose according to his imagination. The desire to create comes naturally, without a master's guidance, whether it be to serve a Higher purpose, as a labor of love, or to embellish fundamental ideas. The creativity is there. But, the reason for submitting to a true master is simply to grow.

"Their intellect will take delight in drawing, provided their nature attracts them to it of themselves, without any master's guidance, out of loftiness of spirit. And then, through this delight, they come to want to find a master; and they bind themselves to him with respect for authority, undergoing an apprenticeship in order to achieve perfection." - Cennini

I also found this next excerpt to be insightful and also kind of hilarious. The chapter is titled, "HOW YOU SHOULD REGULATE YOUR LIFE IN THE INTEREST OF DECORUM AND THE CONDITION OF YOUR HAND; AND IN WHAT COMPANY; AND WHAT METHOD YOU SHOULD FIRST ADOPT FOR COPYING A FIGURE FROM HIGH UP" The idea of making life-choices revolving around the condition of one's hand is so funny to me. But it makes SENSE. (As both an artist and a lesbian.) I couldn't tell you how many close-calls have potentially limited the use of both my hands. Actually, one of the reasons I stopped playing viola regularly, is because I have this irrational fear of developing carpel-tunnel syndrome. Even drawing and painting for prolonged sittings stirs up this anxiety of losing the use of my right hand. Also, Cennini explains that, as an artist, you should arrange your life accordingly, as if you were studying something like philosophy. He stresses a degree of self-discipline.

"[...] eating and drinking moderately, at least twice a day, electing digestible and wholesome dishes [...] saving and sparing your hand, preserving it from such strains as heavying stones, crowbar, and many other things which are bad for your hand, from giving them a chance to weary it."

This line reminds me of that character, former hand model J.P. Prewitt, in ZOOLANDER (Hah!) Perhaps the Renaissance Men were the pioneers of the first ever, climate controlled, humidified and temperate regulated glass hand. Lol. How funny is that.

This next part. Is just. Too. much. Too. Funny.

"There is another cause which, if you indulge it, can make your hand so unsteady that it will waver more, and flutter far more than leaves do in the wind, and this is indulging too much in the company of women." - Cennini

As with the Christian Priesthood - I guess painters, too, were expected to maintain some degree of chastity. But not entirely! So, maybe "chaste" isn't the right word. Note, "indulging too much". Basically, promiscuity would result in an unsteady hand. So quit jerkin' the gherkin, contain the beast, don't follow Lil' Wayne's example of "fucking every girl in the world" or "goin' down that drain, girl" or "open up her legs and filet' mignon that pussy". And you will be on the right path of artistry and salvation! ... according to popular belief in 14th and 15th century Italy, I mean.

This is Giotto's fresco, "The last Judgement" over the entrance of the Arena Chapel in Padua, Italy. I think it was commissioned in 1305 or around that time?

?

I figured that it was about time to blog. But - I cannot, for the life of me, even begin to organize the plethora of ideas and opinions that are running circles around and around in my head, into a legible format of any kind.

I am going to do horrible things to this canvas.

And by "horrible" I mean fan-fuckin'-TASTIC.

And,

I know so many gifted people. I wonder how many of them know how gifted they really are. Probably not many. As artists, we are our toughest critics.

Eleventeen.

I am 11 years old today. There is no party - I don't like having parties anymore. There is a cake though, and streamers hang from all 4 corners until they meet and intertwine with the ceiling fan in the center of the room. There are pink balloons and presents stacked high on the kitchen table, in no particular order. Dad must have been up at 5 in the morning to pull this off - He always beat me to it, and I'm an early riser. There is a stack of Birthday cards at the center of the table, they read, "love, Grandma" "love, Dad" "love, Christopher and David" there is even one from the pets. One card is absent. Never have I quite experienced a birthday like this one. You have never been absent before. Everything is aesthetically perfect. Everyone is smiling. Everyone but me. I can't remember exactly what I got on this particular birthday, all I can seem to remember is what I didn't get.

Weeks later, a package arrives. It's a large package. And it has my name on it. Sitting, straddling this box, I stare with bewilderment, hesitating, but my modesty is fleeting. I open it, moving it closer toward me with a jerk, amass with packing peanuts which, at this point, are flowing from all sides of the box, from beneath I uncover 2 sun dresses, 3 T-shirts, some assorted jewelry, and a box of floral stationary. On the box is a post-it note that reads, "Write to me whenever you'd like, whether you are happy or sad or lonely or just to say 'Hey' [...]" There is also a letter. It's 7 pages in length. I'm 11 years old and I can't read cursive. I brush it aside. "This isn't important." Instead, I try on the dresses, the shirts, the jewelry. I unwrap the stationary and begin writing you a letter thanking you for the gifts. There's something missing.

You didn't leave me with a return address. Not a real one, anyway.

My "nerd" tid-bit for the week. Hopefully.

These are incredible time-lapsed videos of printmaking, bookbinding, and papermaking processes, the first of which was done by a MICA alum [This is what we DO!]. This video is just awesome, I don't really know what else to say. Monoprinting and intaglio techniques in the beginning, letterpress, kettle-stitching the spine of 35 books by hand, she even sews her own headbands. She also makes her own paper for her coversheets - you will see this process later on in the video. Months of hard work, condensed into a 5 minute stop-motion video. I've seen this a hundred times but it never ceases to impress.

[If this wouldn't be impressive enough without audio, I'm pretty sure that the song is by Ratatat. As if it could be any better.]

This next one is a little longer, and kind of anticlimactic... but is still worth watching the first couple of minutes and then fast-forward to the end product. This is a pulp-painting "print" of a Chuck Close painting. Basically, what "pulp-painting" is... Okay, let me explain a few things first. Paper is made from a pulp. It might help to think about it like orange juice - the kind labeled "extra pulp". If you were to put that orange juice through a strainer, the pulp, or orange FIBERS would be left behind when the water is drained from it, right? And when it dries out, it would become sort of like a solid surface. Paper is the same way - Its made from tiny fibers (like cotton, for example) which are strained through a mold, pressed and made flat, and then put through a drying system. When the fibers are interconnected, this creates a surface and, depending on how long or short those fibers are, this usually dictates how strong the paper will be. Short fibers are easier to tear, whereas long fibers (typical of traditional Eastern papers, specifically Japanese) are very strong. Pulp "PAINTING" is when the pulp is separated and colored with pure pigments, and these guys have come up with a system of using color coded bottles and stencils to produce a replica of a Chuck Close painting. Only, this is not a "painting", per say... but rather, it's simply just PAPER. VERY cool stuff.

Friday.

I am so heated by everything this person has said that I don't even know what to say. The only coherent thoughts and words I would be able to form, I would likely regret saying later. Because a conscience is a beautiful thing. The very force that keeps me from spewing out word vomit drenched in hateful, hurtful, and heartless things. And in turn I can live, reflect, and sleep soundly at night knowing that I have the capacity to see what is beautiful and what is good.

I feel sorry for those who don't.

Those who do not respect a person with this capacity for love, with this drive, with this knowledge, simply do not deserve this courtesy.

Just as I regret having ever allowed myself to fall under a spell; All the while, your charm veiling something much more sinister and less desirable to me. In any context.

I will now go back to sleep in a nest of pillows and tissues

some fresh, some soiled...

until this sickness subsides and I am "unearthed"

[see above - aquatint etching and watercolor]

from my hibernation

Only to be confined once again to this apartment, this time due to inclimate weather conditions :(

F you blizzard!

"Your setting sun, your broken drums, your little drugs [...]"

I forget what healthy feels like.

And, H.S. art teachers are so much more human 3+ years down the road, when they are not your teachers. Jeff Sharp, I'm diggin' the handle bar mustache. You're also cool as hell.

Philagrafika 2010