Crack Fancy

I am stoked to get back to SD to make some art. I have some nonsense ideas in my head and I want to get them out before I over think them. I was shell-shocked with excitement the other day while perusing the army surplus store in San Jose...got a SWEET dome tent for a mere $40, as well as another cheapo mummy bag and some tiny glass vials. I was flipping out in that place. There goes my Christmas moolah...but for good cause!

My dad's letting me borrow (indefinitely) his fancy fancy film camera. I'm excited to mess around with it. I think that photography might be a helpful addition to my art. Not everything is best in 3D.

At Grandma T's house the other day I told her that her Zwiebach croutons were so so so addicting that I was sure there was crack in them. "Just a pinch!" she said. A truly hilarious quip from my saintly Grandma.

Art Making

"Criticism's prescriptive effect paralyzes the inventive impulse of making and locks artists into an impoverished "poststudio" position in which art making is conceived largely as a conceptual or symbolic act. But this simply isn't true. For all the crucial significance of conceptualism, art is never only an idea."

Johanna Drucker

In Mourning. For the City. And for friends.

I have returned.

End of the semester was a total frenzy of paper-writing, show preparations, gallery work, hanging drywall (a self-inflicted punishment, really. My only regret of the semester was cutting open that damn hole!), and an array of other loose ends to be tied. Perhaps the most exhausting aspect of leaving NY was having to finally admit to the fact that saying 'goodbye' to The City also meant saying goodbye to a sweeeeeet group of people as well. I got a little sadder with every adieu that I passed out until the last night when I nearly lost it after saying goodbye to my two remaining friends. I hate to admit to my sensitive shortcomings, but I became a complete sap in those last few, dark hours (not metaphorically dark--actually dark. 1am is a dark hour. Although, truth be told, my mood at that time could possibly be classified as dark as well.)

I am now home and "resting," if you can call it that. I am such an antsy pants that I can't sit still for 5 minutes without starting to stress about my senior show (which is, um, MONTHS away) or starting to feel like my brain is going to mush. I'm burying myself in a myriad of distractions...reading art criticism, cleaning, packing(ish), Christmas shopping...anything to stay busy and to keep myself from missing my dear, dear NYCAMS friends too much.

Nevertheless, it is always always ALWAYS good to be home and to force myself into being a social bum for a bit. My family is crazy and fun and my bed is TOTALLY bitchin, especially compared to the plastic thing that I have slept on for the last three months.

Too much stuff!

The end is too near! I would write much much more about all that has happened in the last few weeks (it's been a good month!), but I'm in the middle of writing my SECOND 10 page paper this week, so needless to say my brain is a little sore. Here's a summation, though:

1. My professor Dave Adey (go to his website, davidadey.com to see some SWEET art that I helped him to make!) is from Jersey, and his parents (WONDERFUL people) decided that they wanted to have my friend Michael (a fellow Lomalite) and I stay with them for a night. BEST weekend. They're great people.

2. Finished up my internship--sad, because working for Rob was absolutely awesome. Look up the Cohan and Leslie gallery on google and click on Rob Fischer (under artists) to see the guy I've been slaving under the last few months (kidding). His work is fantastic, and I got to do all sorts of stuff for him...including a full day of welding!

3. Thanksgiving was the best EVER...got to go to Shelly and Kelly's newish house in Foxboro, Mass. Played a ton with the kiddies, ate great food, hung out with AUnt Karen and Uncle Larry...so wonderful. Couldn't have been better!

Extras that make the city wonderful.

Description of pictures:
1. Museum of Natural history. For a nerdy artist with a love for nature, the obscure, and the ridiculous, this place is a freaking gold mine. I don't know if seeing these animals in the wild could be anymore thrilling.
2. Dia:Beacon. A wonderful museum. Seeing Richard Serra in person is a borderline religious experience. I've already been made fun of for that statement, but they just don't get how otherwordly it really was. Incredible. Not to mention the fact that Beacon (the town) is situated in nearly-upstate NY, and the trees are golden and the buildings are quaint. It was gorgeous.
3. Best Sunday yet: Bagels (INCREDIBLE ones, no less), church, watching the NYC marathon, a random stop at the Guggenheim for art and coffee...and not working in the studio until late. OH, and wonderful wonderful friends. It was glorious.

art...coffee...art....celebrity....coffee...coffee...

New York has been much more generous to me in the way of celebrity sightings than Hollywood-famed California has ever been (not that I've been to Hollywood, and I've only spent a few days in LA). I knew when I came here that Brooklyn Heights, my place of residence, is on of the more posh neighborhoods in the borough. BUT, apparently it is also home to many celebs as well as a key place for filming. A few weeks ago they were filming 30 Rock 2 blocks from our dorm, and....TINA FEY (!!!!!) and the little person from Elf (can't remember his name, but I was slightly more dazzled to see him than I was ms. Tina). Incredible. I thought my luck had run out, but things got even better. The next week Jason Schwartzman was dining in one of my favorite places to get coffee...for crying out loud, I love that guy! So amazing. Again, I thought that my luck had run it's course. But it gets much better. I was super sick this last week and in a moment of delirium I went to hell on earth--Times Square--to go look for art supplies in the massive Toys R Us (nearly hell as well). I'm standing in there, clouded over from the massive amounts of Dayquil that I had drunk in lieu of water and numb from the three analgesics that had only recently disolved, when I see SANDRA BULLOCK! Holy crap she's like in my top 10 of favorites! And, she was beautiful. Botoxed, a bit made over, but beautiful. She had a very serene smile plastered on her face which I assumed was her way of preventing overly-excited paparazzi from mistaking a relaxed mouth for depression or potential outbursts or something. It was awesome. I would have stood in awe for another few minutes (oh yea, and I nearly bumped into her and Jesse's daughter) but the camera-laden girls started rushing over and I didn't want to be around when the craziness struck. Still, pretty freaking awesome.

On a more serious note, my coffee consumption is reaching an all-time high. You know you're an addicted when a self-proclaimed creamer-needer starts to convert to the black stuff. Not on purpose, really, but if that's all that's there I'll TOTALLY take it. The artist that I'm interning with is equally addicted to coffee so there is always a supply of hot, black coffee around. I think the other day I inhaled like 3 cups of black stuff, and that's after my morning coffee and before my afternoon serving(s). SO, maybe I should back off. But I also kind of need it.


Below are 2 pictures of some of my favorite works. The tubes are of fiberglass, created by Eva Hesse (a total badass artist responding to macho minimalist culture), and Jeff Koons (equally badass, totally pop culture meets readymades meets beautiful). I love them both and I love being able to see their work.

A pleasant arrival of the most joyous sort.

This morning three of my best friends landed in town.

Now, I pride myself in making friends fairly easily. I enjoy meeting new people, and it takes me little time before I feel at ease and comfortable. Thus, being at NYCAMS with all these new fabulous people has been wonderful and hardly a stress at all. Seeing my friends, however, threw upon me such an overwhelming feeling of ecstasy that I nearly checked them into the street hockey-style when I saw them.

The basic order of the day: Bagels (best f'ing bagels you will ever, EVER dream of having), Chelsea gallery hopping (the good, the bad, and the boring), Magnolia cupcakes (a must-do for the cupcake connoisseur, as well as for the Sex in the City fiend), brief rest, pizza, coffee, and...a glorious 10:30 bedtime. We are freaking exhausted. We walked everywhere because the weather is oh-so-gorgeous, and when it's sunny as heck outside the drab subway just doesn't cut it. PLUS, during an earlier subway trip to the New School this morning, Kristen and I would up sitting next to a homeless man who stunk so badly that my bagel threatened to leave it's semi-final resting place. Not appealing.

Being reunited with these lovely girls is bringing out the silliness in me to the n'th degree. I'm a pretty laughter-prone person as it is, but the snorting laughter has taken it's throne consistently throughout the course of the day.

And now, because I am exhausted and because Juliana is offering me a shoulder rub, which will undoubtedly leave me comatose, I will end this short and semi-pointless blog.