making and breaking

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2009-05-08T22:15:00.001-07:00

This is a test post from , a fancy photo sharing thing.

2009-05-08T22:11:00.001-07:00

Testing???

WHAT THE KE?

2008-05-17T17:44:00.000-07:00

I took the train out to the opening at the Claremont Grad. School yesterday. I got there just at the end- but it was really nice, probably my favorite show I've been in- and I took awful photos (!) It was hung super minimally. I really like the amount of space everything had.
I met some of the students there (two I knew-accd classmates) and got a tour of the studios. It just made me want to go to grad school a lot. I love the idea of being around that many people working all the time.
I got a kick out of Christina Pierson who showed us her studio. She works with super simple material- and then tracks the light that hits them, or reflects it or...
After messing around with vinyl lettering this week I keep thinking I should try new materials.

So here are some photos of the show. Thanks to everyone who so kindly showed me around and fed me cupcakes and beer.

(the pinkish piece in the corner is mine)

On the subway home this morning there was a group of about 8 kids (10-12?) years old all with skateboards. They ran up the escalator at civic center before I could get a great picture. I envied them so much- that was exactly what I would have been wanting to do at their age: riding the subway downtown, no adults and fours wheels.

2008-05-12T20:30:00.000-07:00

hello...this has been such a busy time. I am posting this in hopes of keeping in touch with all the people I have been wanting to call... so catching up.

In the last three months I got a job at Gemini, moved into an apartment in West Hollywood and became a pro at figuring out a good part of the L.A. transit system. Very very eventful.
Here are some photos...

My boss calls this "my new digs". I think that means my new place. (Part of why I like my job is because I like my boss (83) so much. Is that weird?)

Up until I moved I was spending about five hours a day riding the trains and buses back and forth from WeHo to Pomona. This was a daily odyssey that literally scrambled me. I don't know how to explain it- but around the same time a friend lent me a Japanese novel about a man who is struggling each day to move a sand dune away from a house he is trapped in. I couldn't think of a better comparison.

I just finished a bookcover for Mcsweeny's and a couple pieces for an upcoming show. I guess I'll wait till the book comes out to post the final pics. But here is the info on the shows this weekend.

East and Peggy Phelps Galleries at Claremont Graduate University, 51 East Tenth Street, in Claremont, California in between the 210 and the 10 freeways. For general gallery information please call (909) 607-3631 or visit www.cgu.edu. Claremont Graduate University presents under current, an exhibition that examines a collective anxiety and the ways that contemporary artists engage with this experience. The exhibition brings together works by twelve emerging artists from the U.S. and Europe working in various mediums. It opens on May 16, 5 - 9pm with a free reception open to the public and runs through May 30, 2008.

This one is the third time they've done it in S.F. It is usually pretty great. How can trees be bad? I'll post mine tomorrow...

I hope everyone is well. As soon as I unpack I promise I will call.
Also a good friend, Drew Beckmeyer is showing at tinlark this weekend. I'll be there, will you?

2008-03-03T14:18:00.000-08:00

It has been two weeks since the opening of Overgrowth, our show at GR2. I am just now posting about it but it will be closing in about ten days. Thank you to everyone who came.
The opening was great and I was excited to have so many people who mean a lot to me show up. Not only did my brother and family make it out- but also a lot of the instructors/artists I admire. I only wish I had taken more pictures (luckily Eric from GR did- so I am borrowing a couple of his- I hope he doesn't mind to much ) This is my brother and his family on the left.

I just changed my website and put up some new work. I am hoping the new format will let me update more often. It is still not finished, but almost.

This weekend we went out to a lot of shows and museums etc. Saturday was Aaron Smith's opening at Koplin del Rio- very exciting. We stumbled into a to cool for you opening at Angstrom, where even Mauricio noticed that everyone was beautiful and skinny. The most memorable part of the night, however, was the impossible parking in the alley. The Indian cultural club/place next door was having some sort of a (fancy) function and had people arriving feeling rightly entitled to parking, and fighting/blocking all the slightly drunk opening attendees who were beaded in between.

Sunday we went to see the new Eli Broad addition at LACMA. I was very excited to go. But I came home a little unsure of what I thought. In the books I had always liked Jeff Koons, but seeing all his work together I felt he was mocking me, and disgustingly cold. Why so much Koons? Very unsettling. He made the Baldessari behind him seem warm and thoughtful in comparison. I did love the Lichtenstein paintings, the Ellsworth Kelly, and the Cy Twombly. I thought the Rauchenbergs at MOCA were better. Mauricio (who just had surgery for a hernia) found this Warhol especially sympathetic.

On the 2nd floor, I found out I hate Damien Hirst. Possibly unfairly, but with such intensity I don't have the energy to think about it. I was excited to see the Cindy Shermans. The best part of the whole museum, I thought, was the room of Leon Golub and the table by Robert Therrien. That was amazing.

In the last gallery (bottom floor)I liked the Richard Serra pieces more than I would have thought. It is a strange thing to have them indoors- being that they feel like the outdoors simply because of their size.

Exiting the museum, however, I suddenly realized I was all the way through and there were almost no women included; in fact, it could almost be the museum of white male artists. Not that I have a problem with white guys, but how boring, and especially in L.A. which is fantastic specifically because it is not a city of white men. Babara Kruger was prominent in the elevator shaft- but what is that? Almost like a band-aid over the rest of the collection? Like if you stretch a feminist artist over the outside of three floors you don't have to actually put any on the inside of the museum? I understand the amount of artists was few- but it still felt awful and discouraging to realize.

I am not sure why I am posting this- if only to alleviate my frustration. Partially it was Mauricio's idea. He wanted me to write a letter; I love that he thought someone would listen to me and actually do something.

I hope everyone is well.

2008-01-28T00:11:00.000-08:00

I'm Home!
It felt weird for about three days. But now the fact that I was gone feels weird.
I wish I could post pictures-but my camera broke on my first day there. Fried by a French Best Buy employee (FNAC), whose was kindly trying to help me replace my battery.

Since coming back I have been working on two upcoming shows. I am especially excited about the one at GR2. Brian Rush, Zachary Rossman and I have been passing some collaborative pieces back and forth, and they are coming out super interesting. And there is a lot of them. Painting is so much easier with six arms.

So here are the postcards with the info for the show. I hope you will come! I am also including a picture of my studio in all it messiness. Hurrah. It does feel good to be back at work.

Also I returned to a few copies of Step Inside Design Magazine's Jan/Feb issue on my desk with the interview I did. I was happy to see the images printed pretty good (not funky colors.) Hopefully you think so to. I feel pretty thankful to have been included.

2007-12-22T02:09:00.000-08:00

I am in Italy now. I just finished a week in France that was completely overwhelming. There were so many museums, so much art, that I felt like I was gorging myself. I am about to leave for Sardegna to spend Christmas. I hope it is a wonderful time for everyone, whatever you are doing during this time and I wish everyone a wonderful new year as well. I will return on the 9th of January.

Buone Feste!

2007-12-10T07:23:00.000-08:00

So the mini show is up at Abacot. I really want to see it. I was supposed to go Saturday but after a long day in the print shop at full speed, along with a lunch with our landlady friend, babysitting, six loaves of banana bread, a Hanukkah dinner, and bags to pack all on the horizon for Sunday, I found my car driving home and not to Chinatown.
So will you take pics for me?
Here is a piece I did for it.

Here is more art. Gingerbread houses Mauricio and I made with my nephews. The youngest had the most brilliant gingerbread man to house dialog where it was decided that the gingerbread man wanted to be glued to the house. Beautiful.

In matter of hours I am leaving for my trip. Id like to update while abroad, but if it is not possible I hope everyone has a wonderful holiday and I give you my best wishes for the new year.

2007-12-06T21:40:00.000-08:00

I haven't updated in a bit. I was planning a big post to try and explain the strange and beautiful thanksgiving we had, but became overwhelmed and instead spent hours doing something else. I wish I could remember what.

We spent the weekend with an Aunt of mine. She lives down in San Diego where we had dinner but spent the rest of the time up a little farther out of town at Skye Valley Ranch. I have always heard of "the ranch" from her and her kids but thanksgiving weekend was the first time I had ever been. My aunt is actually my Mother's half sister, and her husband (who's uncle and aunt own the ranch) is deceased. I am not sure what we were thinking when we agreed to go, despite the fact that we knew no one and were accompanied only by our younger cousins, but I am glad we went. It is close to the border, near Tecate, but high in the hills/mountains in the middle of what now is all national parks. It sits in a valley that you wouldn't expect to be spread out up above if you saw it from below (hence, I assume, its name- skye valley ranch) It is only a 15 minute drive out of town to the driveway- but the driveway (or the treacherous dirt path that winds up the hill, and across a thin metal bridge to the house) takes at least and hour to climb. My cousins actually left their horse trailer at the bottom and rode up through the brush.

When we got to the top of the hill however, alone (it takes longer on horseback) I was struck with panic. Basically everyone at the ranch had come out to go hunting. Pulling up, groups of men in camouflage were cooking venison near the bonfire. Dogs were running around, guns were out and it was getting dark. We had driven a whole hour into the middle of nowhere and I suddenly realized I felt very out of place. Only it wasn't like a party we could just duck out of; we were arriving to sleep and eat, uninvited, at there house. I made Maurico promise to not state any political or religious beliefs, and to keep quiet his immigration status.

Everyone was very nice, of course, and even fed us delicious veggies despite the sign in the kitchen that said vegetarian:an old indian word that means bad hunter. I eventually managed to convince them to let me help prepare diner which put me more at ease. My biggest relief however, was when I heard that despite the major migrant trail that runs across their property bringing at least 40 people a night, to them border patrol, with their speeding and attitudes is a worse enemy than the illegals.

The night we arrived we were invited to play hide and go seek. Only we took out all the ranch vehicle, the rtv's, the golf-cartish thing and two jeeps. Everyone was a little inebriated. It was so beautiful though; the moonlight was surrealy bright and the grass, which is brown in the day, looked silvery and soft. It was exciting too, backing up off a road, then turning the lights off and watching as someone approached, bumping around and attempting to negotiate the same piece of road you'd just escaped. Surprised, they would look up to see you hunting them from the bushes. I was sorry when it was over.

At the bottom left of this picture you can see the road/driveway.

The light part is the ranch as seen from above.
The dark part is water which you can see in the picture of the road up

helping? + best mustache ever

the view from our room the next morning.

Very cool writing found in bottle under the old adobe foundation of the house. So appocalyptic.

Since we returned I have been busy trying to get ready for my trip. I regret being older and wiser. I am thinking a lot more "what if..." than before and wishing I could get back some of that stupid bliss I had when I was young.

Two days ago I had the horror of realizing that my passport, though valid, was in my maiden name, unlike my tickets. Luckily there is an office in Westwood to help people like me. I spent three hours driving there today, crying for the last hour because I was late and I was sure that meant that my trip was really going to be canceled, only to arrive and find that no one cared, it was one big process, and that I have to go back tomorrow to pick it up.

The whole experience felt like something from a dark short story written by soviet russian. After the long drive I had to circle the guest lot, and, though there was parking spots, they were surrounded by a maze of illegal turns necessary to get to them (keeping in mind it is a federal complex and I don't want a ticket). Once inside the low ceilinged beige building, people cut me in line and then progressed while I seemed to stand still. When it was my turn I went to the wrong window. Twice. Angering the people who were supposed to be there and then, as a result, returning embarrassed to the back of the line while still confused about which window corresponded to me. When I finally found my place, they then took away everything that identifies me, including my marriage certificate, and told me to come back tomorrow and appear at a window on the side of the building which supposedly says "will call". As I left, I was sure I would go outside to have the doors shut and then the whole building sort of close in on itself and evaporate. Or at least the window wouldn’t be there. Tomorrow I will regain my identity and breath a deep sigh of relief.

Though I am taking public transportation to get there. It will be a three hour trip both ways, but, considering the cost of gas and my inability to even go to the right window let alone drive under such stress I think it will be a better choice. I only hope I don't get on the wrong bus.

Today’s anxiety led me to buy a map and a phrasebook for Paris. These are two thing I never would have bought when I was younger. I literally bicycled through Denmark and some of Germany using only the free brochure size tourist maps they provide in each town on the back of advertisements for museums or hotels. When I got lost I would sometimes ride through the whole village before I could find someone to ask direction from. He or she in turn would then go and find a youngster, like a grandkid, whom they were sure spoke english because they had studied it a whole two years in elementary school. The kid would then just look at me with a horrified stare, perhaps because I was going to be living proof of his poor study skills or simply because I was asking to much of his elementary education. Thus the grandparent would frustratedly reprimand him until somehow we would figure out where I was on the map. I would leave them grumbling behind, never once feeling I should have brought a phrase book or a better map. This is what I mean by stupid bliss.

This weekend is the mini show at Abacot. I will post more tomorrow. Fingers crossed that I receive my passport and I take the right bus home. Bonne nuit!

2007-11-20T13:59:00.003-08:00

I just realized I think the show at Junc comes down next week. If you get a chance you should try and see it. (hint hint to my brother and sister) We worked pretty hard on the show. Plus there is a really good pupusa place down the street that also make great juices, so you could have lunch and then sneak to the back of GR/Junc and check it out on a happy stomach.

The address for Junc is 4017 Sunset Blvd. Los Angeles, CA

2007-11-19T17:37:00.000-08:00

So Brian and I made the trip up north this weekend. I am so glad we went. Not only did we get a good amount of paintings done/started, I also had a chance to become re-enamored with Berkley.

I just like that people look healthy and content there. Most women don’t wear make-up and are funky and natural. Kids wear bright red rain boots on sunny days. Men smile and carry their babies around. Cars have bumper stickers. Stores are owned by people. Happy things.

Friday, after Breakfast at this electric blue new-revolutionary cafe, Zach, Brian and I took the train to SFMOMA. Luckily we started from the top down. Olafur Eliasson was on the 5th floor across the bridge (which he modified amazingly). His pieces were primarily interactive, which might seem hokey, but since it was environmentally/science based I thought it was interesting. Especially the little hole filled with mirrors that made you feel like you were a million stories up in a dark building at night. Here is a picture of me in the mist cave.

Following this was a dock with water projected from behind it. As we were standing there, a woman with an older man figured out that if she ran his wheelchair into certain planks she could make ripples. She rammed the chair excitedly about four times while I wondered if this thrilled or annoyed him. It was really dark though, so I couldn’t read his features.

On the next floor we visited the ice car that Eliasson had also designed. I was fascinated by the girls that stood at either ends and importantly called out the temperature of the freezer to each other. I liked the idea of these really young women being entrusted with maintaining the delicate existence of the car. I didn’t stay in the freezer long. Not because of the cold, but because the perfectly formed rows of icicles that made up the car begged me to smash them. I was really surprised no one else had felt the same urge at a more uncontrollable level. According to Zach the incident they did have only involved licking.

The Joseph Cornell exhibit was great but perhaps a bit overwhelming/extensive. I surprisingly found myself wishing it had been edited a little more so that I could spend more time on individual pieces without regretting the hundreds that I had yet to see. He did have an amazing zine like publication called the pultry pages that stuck out for me. It was all about poulty and prizes and appropriated nonsense. Very inspiring.

Though it was a running joke that I see Berkley through rose color glasses, Friday, after we had gone to the Moma I found proof of its undeniable superiority. Zach took me to Berkley Bowl, the hippy market not far from his house (and also near the biggest movie rental place in the world.) It was unbelievable. Every vegetable you can imagine was there, and then for each kind there was a dozen different varieties. I couldn’t even count how many different kinds of mushrooms there were. I did count the sweet potatos. 13 different types. Here is a picture that does not even begin to explain it.

On Saturday we met Brendan and Evah for a late Breakfast at La Note. I thought that ‘note’ meant night, which would have been delightfully ironic, only it doesn’t. Our waitress was really French and unbearably beautiful in a way that makes you believe the French are right to feel superior. The food was good to, but I made a mistake in not getting a savory breakfast. Here we are.

When I told them I was taking a picture Brendan started slo-mo-ing food into his mouth. (Just in case you thought I was being inconsiderate.) La Note has the best potatoes garlic and cooked tomatoes. It made me want to cook. After breakfast we walked through the farmer's market (further proof) and I felt so happy to be with friends and to have had such a nice meal that I spontaneously planned a dinner party while saying goodbye without even making sure it was okay with Zach. (Luckily it was, and we had another nice meal before we left)

After breakfast Zach and Brian hauled out a table into the living room of Zach’s apartment and we all started painting. This was what we did for the next two days (besides eating) and it was really really satisfying. It made me a lot more excited about the show (which we just found out will be the 16th of February). We don’t have a name for it yet. Here are two if my favorites.

Over the weekend I got a chance to read the sequel to my favorite book ever (Youth in Revolt by C.D.Payne). This made me pretty happy. As did the new music Zach introduced me to. Right now I am listening to Kimya Dawson and having a hard time believing I haven’t always been listening to her. On her website she has picture of herself at Cranberry lake, a place my dad would take my brother and I every weekend of the summer when I was in middle school. We would row a rubber raft into the middle of the lake and then jump out and swim around. It was a little scary because the water was so dark, but totally exhilarating. I like the idea of her being there, in that place I loved so much as a kid.

Happy Early Thanksgiving.

2007-11-13T21:35:00.000-08:00

It has been a pleasant though uneventful week. Now, however, enough small things have happened that I feel like I should write or nothing big will ever happen again. Fiber!!

Firstly, this weekend Mauricio rediscovered a metrolink station that actually runs late on Saturday nights not far from our house. It may seem difficult to misplace a metro station, but it has an odd residential/industrial park/alley like entrance right in the middle of the train tracks, suspiciously disguised as though to prevent anyone from finding it. It cost a lot: 10.50 on a weekend and about 15.00 on a weekday, but with the price of gas and my disdain for driving it seemed worth it. Included in the price was the possibility of seeing one of the most interesting exchanges between two people ever. A bigger girl with a crew cut, whom I had assumed was a guy until I heard her answer the phone, sat next to us while we waited. She was sugar talking someone on her walkie-talkie cell when a gorgeous girl with pink braids and a security uniform bounced up to her and said “I know you don’t I?” I kept trying to figure out why her uniform was so ill fitting when she teased “have you ever been locked up?” The girl said no, but they were both so happy about it that it seemed odd. Suddenly I realize that the security uniform was probably some kind of stripper costume, hence it’s weird seams and overly large and generic badge. At that moment they boarded to a different car and I suddenly felt left out from this whole train riding stripper world.

So we took the metro to Union Station. I love riding the train. We rode the train a lot when I was a kid and I think something about just grew into my bones. When I work late at night I sometimes hear the same train coming through Pomona that my family used ride every summer . Its whistle seems so significant, as though the sound itself materializes the dark moving mass of beginnings and endings on which you can barely sleep for the company of your own life. Someday I would really like to get the Amtrak pass and head around the states before train travel is phased out altogether.

I swear I played with this thing in the late 80's.

When we got to Union Station I was starving, so instead of jumping to the gold line we ran across the street to Plaza Olvera. The Plaza was all set up for a slick televised concert sort of thing: the stage was fancy, there were huge tv cranes and lights were flashing. Only the a dj was on, but at that volume, and with the lights, it actually felt very festive. What made Mauricio most excited, however, was the cafe on the corner that had champurrado (a cornflour drink with cinnamon and sugar). While we waited in line I ran into a guy I recognized from the midnight ride we took two weeks ago. I thought maybe he was riding downtown again, but he explained they were riding, on bike, to San Diego that night. He was following a guy who's bike was one step up from a fixed gear. I wonder if they had many hills? I wish we could have gone.

We walked from downtown to Chinatown with our champurrado warm stomachs. There, I promptly ruined that good feeling by drinking beer. The brew somehow mixed with the cornflour and then rose in my stomach. Logical right? Like a recipe for bread or something.

Up at Abacott gallery (in Chinatown) is the work of my two old roommates Eric Nyquist and Mike Mattheson. It was nice to see both them and their paintings. I do miss having hard working artists around to motivate me.
Here is a nice pic of them- though their work is pretty to.

We missed our train and ended up spending a good chunk of the night watching the concert. I was into the music of Calle 13- but when he rapped (poorly, I thought) about girls and his sausage sandwich I walked back inside the station in protest. To put salt in my wound, once inside, I started reading the newest Rolling Stone anniversary issue themed "where we're going" based on longer interviews with the visionaries of today. Only 3 of the 25 visionaries were female. Are we really that shortsighted as women? Because the blatant inequity of the it made me wonder if it is not the other way around. Until our 11:30 train came it was just us, a few sleeping guys and the man who polishes those endless shiny floors of Union Station. He really was a powerhouse, more entertaining to watch than calle 13, especially when he nimbly lifted up the feet of those to inebriated to lift theirs themselves.

I have been on an exercise kick, started by our 60 year old landlady who is kind enough to, somewhat forcefully, teach us her calisthenics routine every Saturday. So Sunday night we rode our bikes to the bookstore that is across from Maurico's bus stop, to which he rides every morning. I think Mauricio was excited to show me the boat house on the route. I will have to put a picture since it is hard to explain, but basically there is a large boat on top of a house, with a seperate part towering into a faux lighthouse; all very theatrical. This morning I accompanied him again so I could see it in the daylight. I was coasting back when I saw a man entering seven eleven, counting a wad of money, wearing an un-buttoned plaid flannel that revealed an entire set of keys hanging from his pierced nipple!!! I felt like it was shiny reward for having exercised.

As far as art work… This weekend I am headed to San Francisco to work on collaborations with Brian Rush and Zachary Rossaman for the show in February at GR2. I am really excited about them.

Joshua Tree

2007-11-05T10:46:00.009-08:00

Mauricio and I took our teenage nieces camping at Joshua tree this weekend. It turned out to be an excellent trip despite all the trials that plagued us at its beginning. We left Saturday (the oldest had Saturday school) and could not seem to get on the road. The check engine light had gone on in the car, then the battery died and we had to go buy jumper cables and jump it. We didn't have nearly enough room for all our stuff- and by the time we arrived (around 3:30pm) all the regular camping was full. groan...

It turns out the overflow camping is north of the park on a dried up lake bed. It is a vast nothingness of dirt. The directions actually have you follow electric poles because the makeshift roads are not marked. When we got the lake-bed we drove over to where we saw a port-a-potty and a couple of hippy vans and almost exploded out of our car. Soon after we had all used the facilities, a man with a grateful dead shirt hiked over to tell us that they had rented the port-a-potty for a private party, that they were going to be very loud, that there was going to be a live band and that they would shortly be shooting at a makeshift range: we might want to move. We agreed- gave him eight dollars so we could keep using their bathroom and then drove to the other side of the lake bed and set up camp.

This turned out to be very spooky. The walk to the bathroom was a little under a mile and in the dark the flashlight would have nothing to land on for most of way besides pieces of scrap and funny shadows in the dirt. Then bouncy lights came up on the other side of a nearby mountain. (maybe there is a millitary base?) This would have been strange enough but then blasts started from where the lights had been that shook the lake bed and made us all go very quiet in anticipation. The girls were ready to get out of there and Mauricio and I had to pretend like we weren't worried.
Since I had hardly slept the night before, I did fall asleeep before they all went out to greet the strange parade of police, motorcycles and cars that passed our tent and went up the mountain; we assume to investigate. Ironically, we had offered to take them camping in place of a promised trip to knott's scary farm. In the end they decided this had been a lot scarier.

The next day we fooled around on some of the big rocks and then finally hiked Ryan mountain. This was really a challenge for the youngest- and made arriving at the peak feel truly triumphant. I am posting some completely cheesy photos as proof.

(mauricio insisted on buying firewood ahead of time...)

This was going to be the great group photo of the trip- only I managed to "kill" it by poking Mauricio in the eyes. I though he was giving me horns but he had actually leaned his head on top of mine. Afterwards he gave me a big lecture about using my five senses; a speech which my nieces found endless opportunities to repeat back to him. It became a pretty big joke. I still feel bad- but can't help cracking up at how awful the photo is.

illustration

2007-11-02T02:56:00.002-07:00

Since I haven't put up any art since the show announcement I'm posting an illustration I just finished. It is for a flaunt article on bio-diesel and its celebrity promoters. I wish I could do more stuff like this, since it let me research a bunch of stuff I am interested in and paint something that I almost might have painted anyways.

2007-10-29T22:55:00.000-07:00

I went and picked up my pictures from costco today. Sunday, Mauricio and I ended up riding around Pomona on bike, stopping to take some photos and look around. I wanted to try out the cameras that arrived. I remember now why I like digital photography, it is so cheap. But once I got these on the computer I think I could see a difference. They almost seem sharper. Since there is so much digital work these days I wonder if that sharpness is what makes them look old, because the color is pretty normal.
The better pictures came from the cuter camera. I am not sure if that is because I favored it, or if it really has a better lens. I really like it though. Even as just an object. The buttons are in all different places: you wind it on the bottom left and the shutter is next to the lens! Plus it is all rounded.
It is hard to be a beginner at something again, and to know I am probably cliche, akward etc. But at the same time it is very exciting. Almost all of my exposures were relatively correct (both cameras are meter-less rangefinders) which, despite there being few correctly exposed pictures I cared for, did give me something to be proud of.

I actually would like to photograph this again- I like the idea more than the picture. It is this row of shacks, and at the end this entirely free standing door in the place of a gate. It just looks so odd.

The cute camera.

midnight ridazz

2007-10-28T01:32:00.000-07:00

Last night we went on a midnight ridazz bike ride through downtown. It was excellent. Exciting to feel safe on the street and just to be with so many people in a moving mass. The only downside was the frequent breaks (well 3) apparently to smoke out. I was having so much fun riding that I was sorry to stall around.
The second stop we descended on a Shell station outside downtown. We were there for a while when the Shell tanker truck pulled up. Poor guy, he had people climbing all over the truck, trying to reach in a blow the horn. He could barely move. The people started yelling "we don't need your gas." I never imagined that I would feel bad for a gas man.
If I had no sympathy at all I probably would have thought the pirates (yes, most were in costume) climbing up the ladder on the back of the truck was pretty amusing. I did feel like I was watching some punk version of peter pan. I can ride, I can ride!!
Eventually Maury and I got tired of waiting and took off on our own. And promptly got lost. However downtown was magical and quiet and almost devoid of cars.
We did stop and ask for directions but I totally could not concentrate since the woman was convincingly dressed as medussa. So we got lost again. We spent more that three hours riding the bikes.
Today, after our ritual Saturday morning Hong-Kong-style-Kung-Fu-calisthenics with our land lady (I have to get picture of this) I pretty much crashed out.
Two more cameras (I bought of ebay for like 10$) arrived though, so tomorrow after I work on sketches I am going to try and test them. They are both rangefinders and my brain is struggling to remember how to calculate exposures, let alone distances. geez. Amazingly film is nowhere to be found. I can't believe how quickly it disappeared.

video from when we rode through the tunnel

this is just a break- but you can see how rowdy we were. And this is before jump-roping started. Also mauricio has a cute cameo.

we took over the metro on the way to the ride.

more news

2007-10-26T03:43:00.001-07:00

random goals:
update website
get up the guts to start asking people (neighbors) if I can take their picture
make reservations at youth hostels in barcelona and paris. (any suggestions?)

a picture to make it pretty: (the sky is still smoky and pink)

I won this...

2007-10-24T05:29:00.001-07:00

has anyone ever used one of these?

or developed 120 film?
I am trying to be brave and not nervous about it.

fire and dreams

2007-10-24T03:52:00.000-07:00

Today I found myself behind a construction fence on the top of a mountain development. It was at the crest of a housing development full of identical houses that alway seem oddly empty. Being the highest point and the end of the street, I assumed it was the drop-off. I was trying to peek over when suddenly an older man on a bicycle surprised me. He had come up a path along the fence and was coughing and wheezing because of the ash. Seeing as how the fence was in front of a water treatment plant, I was sort of confused to see him trespassing. He knew the way through the barrier though, which he pointed out, and then promptly headed back down.
When I got to the other side I was shocked to find the whole top of the mountain, as far as I could see in the haze, divided and flattened. Looking out at that expanse, with the fire behind it, I felt like I was in my own bad dream. I walked, trying to get to the edge, but realized it was at least two miles and that it might be dark by the time I turned around. It's emptiness made me want to scream if only to fill the space. I am going to go back tomorrow. I think the reason there was no construction was because of the fire's smoke.

I have been taking pictures on this mountain for a project, but I will share these because they seem more timely than the rest.

junc

2007-10-24T03:39:00.000-07:00

so I realized I should probably give info.

the show I just put up will be up at junc for about 2 more weeks. if you get a chance it would really tickle me if you went and saw it.
here is the website for the gallery.

here is a piece I did for the show...

news

2007-10-23T13:11:00.001-07:00

I am awful pleased to be able to announce that I am featured on the huffigton post..It is like a strange redemption through politics. If that makes any sense. I felt kind of silly- and yet awful happy to get a chance to explain my work.

today I might print

2007-10-17T14:30:00.001-07:00

now that that junc show is hung I have to think about february with Zach and Brian.
I am thinking about giant fabric silkscreens... umm yeah...a sets of prints and possibly some panel paintings. What do you think? it is already getting late!!!
I would love to write a little comic to go with that stuff.
I am starting a new project for next october. I am going to be super quiet about it though. oops. I really like the idea of secrets that come to fruition.