G-4
Work in progress
This needs something, but I"m unsure what it needs. It feels incomplete, I'm not sure where I was going with it.
"You have the ability to sense and know a Higher truth"
This painting, using what seem to be my signature colors is a contradiction. The fortune says "you have the ability to sense and know a higher truth" but the painting is a showcase for the complete and utter confusion feel about everything in my life. Even if I feel that I do know a high truth it is almost always wrong. The painting is the emotional pain I put myself through. I don't have any reason why I do it. But it is a continuous thing. The fortune is one of many that I have been collecting for years. This one just happened to be on the floor when I was walking by.
Fear before sublime
I'm amazed we woke up and weren't involved in a gruesome murder, torture session or ritual killings (Redone)
A fear of the sun not coming up
Rather
A fear of the night not ending
A need to know that things end
You can survive anything
As long as there is an ending
But what if the torture never ends
The tight spiral of fear in between my spine and my pelvis
With tendrils that reach out to my hips
Does not uncurl
As the fat gray light of morning
Squeezes through the blinds
It's still too dark at 7:09am
The sun has been stolen
Just as I feared
With my back pressed into the bed
I stare at the dark doorway
Waiting for something to come through at 3:33am
The slightest sound and I'm a startled rabbit
The visions of horror dance through my head
But it's only the cat
The spiral loosens with the air brakes
Whatever it is that inhabits my head
Watching the gray light turn brighter
The sun has not been stolen this night
I imagined this piece much larger, but lack of funds stopped that from happening. While driving in a very fearful part of the woods, close to a military installation, my friends and I came up over a hill to see the grass on fire in a pine forest. There was a small lake at the bottom of the hill that reflected it back. The moment as it washed over me began with fear which fed this feeling of numbness and overwhelming beauty. I haven't tried to capture the scene, but the energy and the feeling of the scene.
G-3
My tribute to Annabelle Chong, a porn star. Annabelle Chong decided she wan'ted to break the world record for having sex with the most people in a ten hour period. Her goal was 300, but due to some internal injuries she stopped at 251, with 251 being the legendary Ron Jeremy. Annabelle wanted to be the worlds most famous porn star but more than that she wanted women to take control of their own sexuality. She struggled in her own life with being herself and being the person people wanted her to be. She was born in Taiwan, raised in London and moved to LA to become a porn star. In her youth in London she was raped by numerous men in a gang bang fashion and I believe her idea to have a huge gang bang was here own way of reclaiming what those men took from her. She believed in the healing power of sex, the feminine power of sex and juts the power of sex for everyone. She stated tat show would have done the gang bang even i she hadn't gotten paid. She loved sex and it was very important to her. She struggled against the stereotypes that were placed on her by everyone in her life including other porn stars. Only a year after her record breaking sex romp another porn star broke hers and made it to 300, though from what I could see the major difference was that Annabelle actually enjoyed what she was doing, where as Jasmine St Clair was more interested in the fame. Annabelle Chong was in college studying feminist theory at the time of her Gang Bang.
Dance the Sheets
4'x3'
Acrylic on 4 canvases
Ride the wild horse
5'x4'
Acrylic on canvas
These painting are two of a series incorporating images from pornography, abstracted them digitally through different techniques, and then painting them in a very loose abstract style. I believe that if people could view sex from different perspectives, they would see something far more beautiful than most see. I am attempting to give them another perspective, This is how I see sex. Wild abandon remembered in an instant trhough a blurry memory which abstracts the reality. It is not dirty, it is not bad, it is powerful and uncontrolled and overwhelming.
Dance the sheets was done on four canvases with the intention that the painting would be separated and displayed with about 2-4 inches of space between each canvas. The third in the series, I have considered painting on 8 canvases and displaying separated as well. Among other things I saw the seperation as the seperation between couples as the sex begins to wane. I see the space between the paintings as a phallic symbol penetrating through the painting. I see the separate canvases as a person each. I considered calling them, masterbation, group sex and orgy, but it wasn't what I was trying to say exactly. I also plan on doing a two canvas and a triptych.
G-2
Emo Queen
Detail
Detail
Detail
Detail
Detail
Detail
Detail
Detail
Emo Queen, myself as odalisque.
If I were an odalisque, I would not lounge about on Turkish pillows surrounded by lavish tapestries and beautiful gardens. I would not have my slaves about fanning me and I would not cavort about in pools with other odalisques. I would be as I've always been, full of contrasts, shut away, forcing pain upon myself as the darkness penetrates. I'd rip out my own heart to make you happy, I told him a thousand times, I just never told him I'd replace it with a sturdier one, one he couldn't break. I was his odalisque, a doll he could manipulate and pose, the way the artists pose their odalisques. I would be dressed the way he wants me to be, look the way he wants me to. But still, no matter how many harems you put me in, or silks you drape over me, I am still, quite simply, the emo queen.
I'm not sure if the above made any sense. It is a little rambly, but it best describes the mentality of the painting and my personal feelings most of the time. I am seated, quite unconventionally on a toilet seat. (no I'm not using the bathroom, the lid is down.) The bathroom is something of a comfort zone. it has always been the one place I can go and be alone. At any and all ages, it has been a haven to escape to at times. The bathroom however, is also a place of sadness for me. Several of my suicide attempts (yes there are quite a few) took place in the bathroom when I was younger. The bathroom is black and white, a study in contrasts, just as I am. A large "poison Arrow" of darkness dominates the visual entry field of the painting leading you to the subject's face. The subjects looks down, as she "puts her heart on the shelf" and replaces it with a new, shiny metal one. There aren't any tears though. She is resolute, firm, a study of concentration. She has stopped to watch the blood flow over her arm were she has laid it under the open wound. The open wound with a vaginal look to it bleeds heavily over her arm, down her legs and onto the toilet seat. THe perspective of the room is slightly twisted in order to disorient the viewer slightly. Blood is splattered everywhere, the girl, the wall, the shelf, the new heart. The title Queen of emo is making reference to the toilet as the throne as well as the term Emo which I have written a short essay on. Emo is just another version of punk but it has come to refer to people who are a little "too" emotional. They cut themselves and make depression into an art form… I was there at the beginning of the emo scene, my original title was the princess of distress, but I think I am past the princess state at this point.
The new orientalism
When orientalism began, Europeans were fascinated with it because it showed them a place they had never dreamed of. An exotic land that was a world away, but also very close. Obsessions with the people, the objects ad the look began to grow and soon everyone was orienting themselves to the Orient. However it was a false Orient. A world that was mainly fictional with a few artifacts thrown in. Artists concocted visions of the orient in their own studios and through the use of photography (the new medium.) People had a false idea of what the East was. Fast forward a couple of hundred years. September 11th 1995 DIC released the cartoon Sailor moon to America. It was not taken to very well originally. However 3 years later in 1998, Sailor Moon became a household name in America, reinstating the NEW orientalism. Other Anime followed suit, Dragonball Z, Samurai Pizza Cat, Digimon, but by far the biggest name in Anime was Pokemon. It wasn't long before More cartoons were in the anime style than they were in any other. People began a new love of the East, namely Japan. The animes that came to us showed us a world we didn't know about. With the internet now in almost every home we are more than familiar with the world of Japan but it still holds a mystery . A far off exotic place where people eat with chopsticks and wear short skirts as a school uniform. Much like the original Orientalism, our obsession with Japan lies in the area of sexuality. Home of tentacle porn, the original student-teacher relationship and of course Asian women, the exotic world of Japan seems like a sexual heaven to many Americans. Sex hotels, the Kabukicho red-light district, and their history of sex slaves would lead most to think of Japan as a sexual cornucopia. With businesses for every sexual fantasy you could ever have and Enjo kōsai, Japan is the new Turkey whose Odalisques and Harems inspired the first orientalism. Every man's fantasy from the 1700's to the 2000's is in the Orient.
Plainfield VT, Winter 2009
These images were made to go along with the series of Goddard photographs I have been doing since I started. THis is the first time that I've gone into town to take pictures. All the other pictures have been taken on campus, in the woods or of the school itself. The other photographs are on this page under different links. I like the feel of these pictures. The colors popping up in the stark whiteness of the snow. It's like a little surprise with every image. To people who see the snow all the time it probably doesn't have the same power but for me it's more amazing than other natural wonders. I look forward to the snow in Vermont every year.
landscape
When I'm overly stressed I just can't handle thinking too much all I want to do is go out and take landscape pictures. I love doing this. It's not that it's easy, it's just relaxing for me.
Dick
The images of a penis are just images of a penis. They are not some great statement about sexuality, gender, or penis envy, What they are is me crossing a line I haven’t been able to cross before. THough I may personally make some works that are thought provoking and controversial, I have not however been able to feel free to put something out there that is exactly what it is. I can disguise and bullshit and hide behind rhetoric, but I have been unable to simply be striaghtforward. Maybe the straighforward work is more boring, less interesting or not as communicative as other stuff, which is fine, but this, for me, was a line that I had been unable to cross until now. The ability to work on something that is considered taboo, even more taboo by many than female nudity, to be able to just put it out there and not worry anymore is a big thing for me.
Sex PSA, Implied and Bonnie and Clyde
Finally!!! Here are the beginnings of the PSA's for sex trade workers. This was not exactly what I had in mind when I began this, back in August, but I like the results.
Sex PSA
The sex trade in America is as vibrant as ever, but with the exception of las vegas it is still a crime to have sex for money. Strippers have a six foot no touch zone from their clients, and porn stars are still looked down upon, even though they are the professionals of what most of us do and enjoy on a regular basis. If I pay a mechanic to do body work on my car, why can't I pay a prostitute to do body work on me. They are both my properties, my car and myself, I am borrowing the workers time and skills, the mechanic and the prostitute, we are willingly agreeing to the transaction that is taking place and at least with the prostitute I can enjoy getting screwed. Strippers are athletes, they dance for hours, work up a sweat and do it to the cheering of crowds, with the help of a pole. Pole vaulters are athletes, they work out for hours, work up a swear and do it to the cheering of crowds, with the help of a pole… and I can go up and shake his hand without worrying about a fine from the cops. Construction workers erect buildings, skyscrapers, small houses, factories and every other thing we see around and they do it topless. Personally I am more offended by the 300 LB construction worker going topless than I would be a porn star. They are the professional athletes of their area. They do what normal people don't do during sex. Some say it is offensive to women, some say it is degrading. Is it degrading to the athletes who are paid to do the things that no one else can do? No, it is just because porn stars are naked and doing something that some people consider private. But If I have to put up with Fat Joe working topless to erect a building, then I should be allowed to watch Jenna Jameson build erections.
Austi's shoot went well, but the lighting was an issue. She was so much darker than Tjae that most o the pictures had to have some heavy duty photoshop done to them. She warned me that she had stretch marks, and usually people exagerate how bad things are, she didn't. I told her I could photoshop them out and I think I did a pretty good job, though aesthetically speaking the stretch marks were kinda cool, they made a bird like shape in her stomach and I thought it very fitting, womb/nest, child/bird. I think I would have had a bird tattooed over top of them.
Tjae's Implied shoot. He's been wanting to do an implied nude shoot for awhile. I think these turned out pretty good. One of these days I'm going to have real lights and a real space to do this in. We shot this in my garage. Really it's more of a carport. so everyone could see what we were doing. Im shocked I didn't have the cops called on me… again. Tjae is so very sculptural. He has planes instead of body parts. I tried to play off of that with these images.
The idea here was suppose to be a Bonnie and Clyde thing, then and now. As I took the pictures I became aware of a couple of things that were odd and not odd. First, I was the outsider, to a certain extent, in this situation. If your skin is white, and you friend's isn't, there is an exclusion that happens, no matter how good of friends you are with someone, when there is someone else of color around. Then of course there is the issues that happen, how to say something, what to say, what not to say, who will I offend, how will I offend. It is this constant discussion going on in your head when you are the odd one out. It's even more odd when you're not REALLY the odd one out. How do you tell someone, my grandfather was black, you just can't see it in me, but let me cool you some collards and fat back and you'll see… or rather taste. let me introduce you to my brother. I feel so odd, because I've never had to worry about really. I just always fit in, and there was never a question. Then in High school I made a remark that was taken as racist… or stereotypical, but it was coming from experience. I was raised the way most black kids in my area were raised. I ate the same food, hungout out the same places, dressed in the same clothes. But this was in the 70's-80's before all this PC shit came into play and people became so worried about what they said. Were as before I could have a conversation in which I spoke in a thick southern draw with a slight "ebonics" sound to it… cause it was the way I had always talked, cause that's how everyone talked that I knew, it was now considered insulting, I wasn't trying to insult anyone. So I went from being, not exactly and "insider", but rather a friend to being an outsider. So I got use to being an outsider and I lost the way I could talk eventually and I still know how to cook what we just call home cookin' but other people call soul food, though I rarely do, but when I talk to my friends who have gotten to know me I stop thinking about, and I don't see color or anything else for that matter, I'm slightly blind to my friends. And then I meet someone knew and I find myself standing outside that circle again, being extra white for fear of offending someone by being myself. Cause if I say "Fitty" I sound like I am trying to be "gangsta" and that makes me fake or a wanna be or something… So I stood there camera in hand seeing these scenes from multiple point of view sociologically speaking. I can see where this was a fun shoot, to kids playing with guns pretending to be thugs and gangstas, old school and new school… I can see the white persons fear, two black people in an alley, with guns… I can see an academics view of the images, two young people of color acting out the destructive forces of their race… but from my point of view, I see two people, who are as far being thugs as I am, who are good friends and are having a good time, but know that there are people who are thinking these other things about them as they do it.
Another shoot with Tjae
Tjae, some shots from the shoot
I labored over what this photoshoot meant to me. I kept thinking it had to be something to do with sex and prostitutes, that was the plan after all. But as I looked at the pictures again and again I began to realize that was not what this shoot was about at all. It was far more about myself as an artist, my artist statement and how to function as an artist and so I give you:
The metamorphosis of man, or creating a interdisciplinary, multimedia man.
In a time full of stereotypes and generalizations I find myself occasionally falling into the traps that have been set for everyone when viewing another soul. My initial take of Tjae was someone with a handsome face who had an interesting writing style and if it reflected his personality at all, a fun loving personality. That was from an initial email and one picture. A few days later I saw several more pictures of him, some of which put him into a "country" theme complete with cowboy hat and boots. This did nothing for his look. In amongst the cowboy hats and the white sheet backgrounds there was a picture that gave me pause. It was the stereotypical gangster picture. He was not inviting, showing his muscle in every sense of the term, and it did not endear me to him in any way. Granted if he is looking for work and that theme is what's selling then, yes, he would want that picture to be seen. However, I fell into the trap and began to doubt. Upon meeting him, i found that my initial interpretation was right. He was fun, open, and honest. He was interesting and as I began to talk to him very multifaceted and multidimensional. I have always chosen to think of myself as interdisciplinary/multimedia rather than "jack of all trades" since that has a negative connotation to it. I began to realize here was some one who was very much the same. our conversations, his look, everything was so diverse it was mind boggling at times.
At first, Tjae was very much like a child, uncertain and a touch of fear about the new person and possible new experience.
As he became more comfortable with me an his surroundings he seemes more like himself, or what I think "himself" is.
Then he began making suggestions of his own and I realized he was deeper than surface level
We talked about religion and philosophy
He is an anarcho-christian, where as I am a pagan anarchist. Similar but different in so many ways.
We talked about horror movies and anime, and how we both love everything Japan, and about the boondocks, a cartoon where the credits show a young black boy dressed as a samurai, carrying a sword and wearing a red sash around his head.
We talked about how we saw prostitutes, and he had a stereotypical outlook, wher all hookers are herione users and live in alleys giving blow-jobs for $50. I told him, not all hookers are like that. they have children, they go to playgrounds and are good people, and some of them choose to have the job they have because they prefer it. They provide a service that is needed. I don't think I convinced him, but maybe I was able to weedle a little worm of thought in there.
He was military, but his beliefs on anarchy and governemnt led him down a different path.
He quoted Plato and Emma Goodman, he joked and was passionate, he paints masks and was willing to try new things, even if they did not seem to fit with his own personal beliefs. He is an anomaly in our culture of conformists. In a society that tells all black men to be thugs, he chose to be different. He has a love of the goth culture and admitted one of his favorite movies is the crow.
In the time I spent with him, I did not realize what I was capturing. I was only aware of the camera and the model, but in the finished pictures, I discovered a timeline of interdisciplinary, multimedia art in my subject. I say that I take one idea across many mediums. In saying that I originally meant I would paint, photograph, sketch, and/or video the same material. That would be multimedia, but in this case, I took my subject, Tjae and we went across several disciplines and drew from them and captured it with the camera. Interdisciplinary… and the photographs show the different areas, though I did not plan this. What started off as a shoot about the injustice of sex trade workers became a shoot about multimedia and interdisciplinary art. We both, pirates, sailing the seas of art discovering new ideas together, without any forethought.
Arianna and Jacob- Senior Pictures
Arianna and Jacob
These are not the kinds of photoshoots I enjoy. I like doing it for my friends, but I don’t wake up excited to do photoshoots for senior portraits, weddings or prom. I’m sure that’s exaclt why I never made any money. I use to do teach traditional headshots to my photography students and we would do a photoshoot fro some model who couldn’t afford to pay for others. I geuss it’s the glamour or just the mindset that the pictures are going to be more special tot he models than to the seniors.
Goddard Forest
I love doing these types of shoots as well. I would choose being a photographer for a nature magazine over a fashion magazine any day. Would have loved to be a national geographic photographer, but I don’t have the uncanny ability to capture spontaneous pictures.
Photographs I took while hiking through the woods next to Goddard college. More on my Photobucket page
G 2 Photograhy
OKC
In the midst of gradution, family and other things in Oklahoma, I got away long enough to snap a few pictures,
A landscape image that I tweaked myself (It looks better than the HDR)
I saw this sign from the road and just HAD to go back and take a picture of it. I love retro things like this. It took a lot of driving around to figure out where it was, but I finally did.
My first successful HDR image. It doesn't look all that much like high dynamic resolution though. But this was the first time I had one that worked in the process department.
My happy place
Would love to tell you this is the HDR, but it's not. Just a normal Photograph I took on my sick day. I love this image, not really sure why, will have to think on it some, but I absolutely love it.
HDR-Fail
The name of this image is FAIL, cause it totally did not work.
I was trying to create an HDR image and it did not work. I think that my exposures where not the correct amount apart and I know I moved a tiny bit on the last picture. Must have breathed. Damn that involuntary muscle action. But No fear!!! I will try again, with a tripod this time!
OBX
Local River, The Neuse, close to flood levels
Snow
The moon girl
I did this drawing because of a conversation Mark and I had. He thinks he tried very hard to be with me, but his idea of trying is to sit around a brood about it and hope that I just show up. To me it feels very much like I do all the work when we are friends and he sits back and decides to take credit. He told me I was the moon but no matter how hard he reached he couldn't ever reach me. I've literally spent the last three years waiting for him to say anything to me, to ask me to come back. Then when he comes back all he does is make cryptic comments and expects me to know what he wants. Sometimes it would be helpful to fall for a guy who can actually speak his mind… at least I think it would. not certain since it's never happened to me. It's like dating a girl. "I'm not gonna tell you why I'm mad cause you should know."
He says I"m like the moon
No matter how high he climbs the tree
No matter how hard he reaches
He can never reach me
If I am the moon
Then he is the stars
Unreachable Even by rocket
Some sketches of ideas for larger artworks based on addiction
This first one was because Mark said he was addicted to the dark. I've done a digital sketch of this on the digital art tab which I had planned on painting when I had it the way I wanted. However, considering the emotional mess which has finally concluded (Hopefully) in which Mark ran away because he couldn't handle JJ undiluted makes me think he doesn't truly understand the darkness and I'm not sure I'm feeling it anymore.
This is a drawing I did specifically for Mark of an idea he had. It is not something I plan on doing.
G-3
The first 2 pages in the storyboard for the big project
The next 4 pages in the storyboard and concept art
More sketches of Pauline, a line drawing of a photograph from a magazine and another of my line pieces
Beginning of the running sequence in the big project. Pauline runs away holding the Kami.
A pretty piece that I think must ave been inspired by my youngest. Can't remember when I drew it but I would be willing to bet she was around.
My perception of the world at times. Everything seems very out of whack and distorted.
A concept piece I started and then quit. I got upset over the bird. I feel that I am not a real artist because I have to look up images to be able to draw them. After starting this one I sent and looked up pictures of birds so that I could draw them better. I feel that real artists don't have to do this.
The birds I drew. I intend to use them in a digital art piece.
g-2 drawings
Most of the sketches and drawings I do are in ink, these are pencil however.
This first is a much better version of my tattoo
drawn during a discussion on the different types of animation styles there are
a drawing done by choosing different typical characterists of people's faces
Another tattoo
Another face compilation
Unfinished face compiltion
One of my sketches of the painting I am doing
Some different versions of gaping chest wound
A drawing I did of Kessy when she fell asleep in the doctors office after a 5 hour wait
Last semester, one of my focuses was on drawing people. I spent much of my time trying to work on my technical skills. Proportion, placement, etc. THis is the first work I have done since then that is based in reality.
An idea I had at about 6am on the plane when I was trying desperately to stay awake so I wouldn't be too disoriented in Dallas. I wrote a poem to go with it on the poetry page.
Walking in darkness
Unseen things watch
They follow as you move
Stop when you stop
Go when you go
Disappear when you look
But you can feel them
Breathing down your neck
Crawling up your spine
Nipping at your heels
Eventually they will get to you
And you will turn around
Back into hiding they go
Until another decides
to take a late night walk
This is after something someone said in Oklahoma. How they could feel someone or something walking behind them, but when they turned and looked it wasn't there. It was like it was stopping when they stopped and it was really freaking them out. That's what she said. Obviously this is a work in progres and will most likely be put on hold for a little while. But I like it. Keep in mind the sketch was done was I was very very tired.
What my scribbles look like after being awake for 46 hours, and sitting in an airport at 4am
I pulled out the sketch book and thought, I wonder what my artwork will look like if I try to do the same thing I usually do but extremely tired. I know some people way they are more creative when tired. I don't think that is the case with me. I am just more loose when tired. I was in the hopes (While I was exhausted) that I would come back and look at these and think they were awesome, but no, not the case. They suck as much now as they did at 4 am.
Working on texture, ellipses and foreshortening
Ellipses are the devil and foreshortening is his cousin. I hate those two.
Made specifically to be used in photoshop
I have a few images on here int he digital art section where you can see some of what I have done with lines like this. I use them to layer over top of other images. Kind of like filligree or something.
Trying to put people into my sketches.
This was a conscious thought on my part to try to put people into what is normally only lines and scribbles. I am happiest with the girl in the jumper. THat drawing was based on what my daighter Kessy was wearing at the time and how she has such a long neck and big eyes.
End of Packet 4
Some line drawings
Sketches of the dolls that will be made and used for the visual representations of the story
White knight
Mudd
Mudd Cont'd
Stonewall
Toad
Brianna
Another sketch for the pauline doll
Another line drawing, more minimalist
A line drawing influenced by Willow. Don't like the boat though.
Things I do when I'm bored
Sketches of dolls
A few of the sketches I have been making for the "book" I am trying to create.
Siren concept 3
Siren Concept 2
Siren concept 1
Mud Concept 2
White knight concept 1
Stonewall concept 1 (unfinished)
More Pauline, having a hard time with her head turned sideways… how do you draw someone sideways who doesn't have a nose?
A new character, this is the sketch for a page of the book
The new character profile
Portrait drawing practice, Johnny depp was first, I did two
And Max Bemis the leas singer of say anything
Some sketches for the book
More portrait practice
G-4
Addicted to the dark
The man addicted to darkness will not want a lover a sunshine. His only love is the night sky, the dark shadows, the darkest corners of the world. The scary thoughts inside your head that you don't want to think about are his necter. The muffled sounds at 2:15am are his music. The creepy crawling entities that can not be seen are his nourishment. He only wants that which is forbidden, broken, unknown, frightening. His lover must be made of darker stuff than even he.
The second sketch, 1st digital sketch for painting "addicted to darkness" continued from the drawing
grunge
Cracked
Old Trees
This is an iamge I altered of the woods at goddard. I'm thinking of using this is part of the opening credits for the video.
G-3
P-5
This is the next one for the series of digital to traditiional abstract sex paintings.
This is the maniulated imge of Annabelle Chong from her Gang bang movie. I'm going to paint the image over a collage board that has been created with a free speech motif. Annabele Chong was shunned even by her own industry for her gang bang idea, even though another porn actress did the exact same thing year later and was not shunned. Annabelle Chong says that she enjoyed and wanted to do teh gang bang and did it as a feminist/antifeminist statement in which she showed who had the power in sex. Not only were men lining up to have sex with her, but she was in charge of her own sexuality. Labels sis not matter to her. Why are men studs and women sluts? She sought to change that.
P-4
an piece I made for my online name. I'm thinking of adding it to some of the pieces as a signature. I"m still working it though. It's a bit bulky.
I wanted to create something using porn. SOmething that was hidden but still in plain view. SOmething that someone may look at and say how nice before they realize they are looking at two people having sex. It's not for the shock value, it's more to change peoples perception or at least cause A glitch in it. Make people look twice, do a double take, rethink what they already know. This was the first piece I came up with. I began this is kind of a Warhol tribute, but it became something else entirely. I'm not so fond of this first one, but it is the first one.
THe followig images were taken from the above image. I used small sections, and overlapped them causeing what I think is a very sexual, sensual series of pieces that are not pornographic intially, only after you realize you are looking ta the close up of two peple having sex. I want to paint these.
P-3
So here I incorporated some of Era's suggestions… I like the larger shadows! that really works wee I think. I brought the water down into the frame rather than skewing the frame… I'm not sure if it's even large enough of a difference to be noticed. I still need to work on the.. Smoke? whispy things? Not sure , it think it's suppose to be impending doom or something, but it's not coming across I think I will try more angular, or less, or none. Not sure. I added some black to make the frame come into the picture and then added some white to the frame. Again this is another, I like, but dn't know if it has the same meanings for everyone else it has for me. I see it as an escape hatch, a way to get out… almost like the tree itself wants to get away, or maybe the birds are flying out rather than too. Ok that's enough of my rambling.
Grrrr… Ok, well, era said the girl with scars and it made me think of this image, kinda. Only my computer decided to go all wonky and I had to do a screen capture to get it because it wouldn't save. So she is the girl with scars, but there aren't any visible scars. She is alone, vulnerable and unhappy. This is a sketch of something that would most likely be a painting or digital piece. This is a big jump from the last piece with the images behind the face.
P-2
This is the second version of the image below. It is still unfinished I am working on it. THe images behind the face are meant to represent some of the thing I struggle with. I thought of using text and may try that next. The images are blurry on purpose, but I'm not sure if I still want them that way. I know I feel they are too angular. This was a quick "sketch" to get an idea of what I wanted to do.
The eternal struggle
I did this in response to my last good vs evil piece. It was too segmented, when there really isn't a line between good and evil. What's good and what's evil is very personal to each person who defines these for themselves. Some will say there is no good, others there is no evil. THe difference between the two can change over time for a person, or in a second. Who even knows which side is truly evil. We assume the less attractive side is the evil side, maybe it is the raw side, the side that is still new. Maybe it is the aged side, wise and intelligent. To assume that "ugly" is evil or "dark" is evil is not only to stereotype but also to alienate. To assume beauty is good is to deify attractive people. THis is the eternal struggle, not good and evil, but the definitions of these to ourselves and knowing if we recognize our own demons be they attractive or scary.
For myself this is a struggle between the morals my life has been marinated in and the things that I feel are moral. My own personal strugle to decide if I am the "Evil person" that some people say I am, the heathen, the demon child. Or if I am actually a good person with different views on morality When you don't follow the moral majority, or really the majority of anything, the majority assumes you are evil.
P-1
these were completely unplanned works. I woke up unable to go to work today and barely able to sit up straight from the stomach pain, no idea what it is. Anyway, I spent all day going through photoshop tutorials and learning new things. I figured I may be miserable but at least I can get some work done. These really don't have any significant meanings ta the moment. These are the pictures we took yesterday on our hike and I used those to play around with. I consider this another part of my art practice. I love doing photoshop, but as with anything else I feel that I have to go to other sources for ideas. rather than coming up with my own. I've been feeling like that a lot lately though.
The somewhat finished idea that started from a sketch here
Using the hand drawn birds scanned into the computer and manipulated I digitally painted the tree, sun, and wind. I used copies of the tree and birds to make waves/reflections/shadows. I want to do something else with it, but I'm not sure what.
This would be one of the scenes from the story "A dark mind" here that I wrote and is the majority of my portfolio. This is the work that I am putting together and exhibiting as my final work. The image would serve as part of the animation or back ground for puppets. It is based on the freedom of the raven to fly away. Or the ability to move on.
At the bottom of this page under story art are some of the images and excerpts from the story.
The vision of good an evil, darkness and light. We are all combination's of the elements not a singular entity. No one is always good or always bad, black or white. We are gray most of the time. Tjae presents himself as a good christian, which I believe int he context given he is, but no one is all good, not when you put limitations on what is good and what is bad. Some would say pirating movies, music, and software is bad… Does it mean that as a christian he should have to go to hell? Does it make him bad person when he pirates it, when he sells it, what if he gives it away to friends? Am I a bad person because I am not Christian? Tjae doesn't seem to mind, does that make him bad? The more I see the less I believe in good and evil, and the more I realize that the redeeming qualities and moral standards are a crock of shit.
Experiments I did in photoshop using color matching
2008 G-2 Art
This is the digital sketch for the painting I am going to do. This is working toward the connection between orientalism of the 17-1800's and Japanese pop culture today. There will be a video to go along with this as well.
Snodalisque
When I saw the snow drifts at Goddard they looked so much like a woman lying there I took about a dozen pictures unsure of how I would use them. After creating Sandalisque my mind immediately went to those images.
The impermanence of snow, the impermanence of beauty, of the body of youth, they are all fleeting and precious but we loose them before we realize how much so. Nature imitates the human body or do we imitate nature. The natural curves of the snow drifts lend themselves to interpretation of the female body. In this one our odalisque is a little less traditional, hiding her face away from view. Perhaps she is too cold or just tired. reclining in a more Manet or Picasso pose or possibly Boucher.
Sandalisque
This photo was taken at jockey's ridge in the outerbanks of North Carolina. My first impression of Jockey's ridge was the desert, I'm sure most people think think of that when they see hills and hills of sand stretching across over a mile and the ocean is not seen easily from the first perspective of entering. Though if you are willing to make the hike you can get to some calm waters on the far side of the dunes. I'm not sure, but I would guess that most people do not follow up their initial thought of the desert with an Odalisque. Something about the shape of the hills, big and small, and the movement of the sand from the, at times, fierce winds, made me think of a woman.
This was a quick work as a statement on the general ignorance of Americans toward the geography and knowledge of other cultures. Much the same way the Europeans generalized and idealized their own views of the area, so do Americans (that puts us what, 300 years behind them?) Although Turkey is a land full of vast beauty and rich landscapes, many Americans think of it as sand and Harems.
Made in China
This work, which was the first finished product from my work on the odalisque is quite different from the video, and they have two completely different meanings. This work is a statement on Orientalism, the concept, the artwork, the irony. When Boucher and then Ingres fist showed their Odalisque paintings the European world was already in the throes of obsession with the Orient. The very idea that young girls were given to men in power held such a fascination. It was exotic, it was far away, it was not Europe. Westerners have had an obsession with the Orient as long as we have know about it. The same interest is still there today even with the communicative devices and ease of travel. We look at images on the web of the far-east and see things that seem strange to us.
However, it does not seem strange to us to pick up a toy and see "Made in China" stamped across it. We (At this point) would not think of buying any electronics without first thinking of Japan. In Sony's early days they bought the America brand name RCA in order to seem more reliable. Today would would trust Sony with our electronic lives. In the 18oo's people were fascinated with the orient, in particular, Turkey and the middle east. Today we are more interested in the far east and their different way of life, however, the far east is closer than we think.
A cover idea
When she turned to find something to do the deed she came face to face with a peahen, her proud peacock strutting behind her.
They looked disdainfully at her and her appearance and looked toward where the raven had been.
"Oh no, see here, no need for that. I will help you get over it… later. Right now lets talk, I haven't talked to anyone in a long time, and when we are done talking I will protect you while you sleep." She looked at the wall and decided she wanted someone to be nice to her, so she would sit and talk to him.
Just beneath the surface under her own reflection she saw the faces of two beautiful women. Their hair a gleaming green over large green eyes, they moved like the water and beckoned her to come in. She wanted the brilliance, and the brightness, she did not want to return to the darkness again and they could give her the light, even better than the raven had.
The voice broke the spell the girl was under and she realized she was waist deep in the water and her Kami’s were being taken from a dead kelpie on the shore by a man who seemed to be growing out of the back of his horse. “Mi’ Lady, I have rescued you and your precious cargo.” He bent as low as he could, considering, and sat up to look at her with a bright smile. She couldn’t help but smile back. “I am the white knight, defender of truth with my sword of logic I roam the dark world helping those who find themselves lost.”
The earth did not come up to meet her as it should have. Instead blackness engulfed her and she continued to fall instead of stopping. Below her she saw a light.
When she opened her eyes she was face to face with a large bat.
Lumbering out of the edge of the forest was the mud creature carrying a large knife and headed toward her. She could tell he was somewhat human, but she could not see a face, just a mud covered figure. She turned and began walking away. She once again became aware of the oppressive presence of the wall to her left.
She took a deep breath and leaned against the tree. "You are nothing, You can't do anything right, You don't fit, You're all wrong." The voices were not very loud, almost like they were inside her head, but she knew that they weren't. They were not familiar voices at all. "Why don't you try to be more like everyone else, why don't you stop running and do what everyone else does and just stand, why don't you forget about what your looking for and settle for what you have?" These voices were soft and persuasive, but still seemed wrong to her ears. "You're a slob! You're a horrible, horrible person! Why can't you just do what our suppose to do?!" The voices ere changing, angry, passive, upset… and they were all aimed at Pauline.
She heard a scratching and scrambling around her feet and look up to find an ermine staring up at her.
The Starfruit Rebellion
In Memory Of
Window
Stonewall comforts the still unnamed Pauline
Unsure of Stonewall, and though Pauline looks great, worried she may be a bit too different from the other Paulines.
Pauline sees the Kelpies beneath her own reflection.
I'm not happ with her face and hair in this one, but I love the clothes.
Pauline meets Brianna.
I really like this one.
Pauline tries to ignore the peahen.
The chase scene. Not happy with this one yet.
something a little different but more me
Just some design experiments
Snow Day
Stuff
Working Hard
Shadow of Nature
Overgrown
My How You've Grown
Messy
Nature Wins
Night Tree
Out of Control
Keeping it Together
Intergallatic Flowers
Country Music
Gothic
City Life
Chaos
Chained and Bound
