singing islands

2010-02-04T08:34:00.000-08:00

whitney and serge

2009-11-29T10:51:00.002-08:00

Whitney Houston vs Serge Gainsbourg
Uploaded by BBBVIDEO. - Check out other Film & TV videos.

take in it

2009-11-29T10:51:00.000-08:00

Atlanta Thanksgiving wasn't so bad this time around
talked with Mason about writing a shitty book about birds
"The eastern bluebird lines it's nest with grass and plant material then lays 2-7 pale blue-white eggs."

new round of job / fellowship applications

aunt sue, i love you
and want to do another roadtrip to Palatka

i need to get some photos developed

going to miami
breathing easier

music for nothing myself

2009-11-03T21:41:00.000-08:00

i made a mix for no one / everyone

love, emily

1. romeo void - never say never
2. beat happening - teenage caveman
3. girls - lust for life
~~4. leonard cohen - is this what you wanted?~~
4. nina simone - suzanne
5. beach boys - i'm waiting for the day
6. ESG - you make no sense
7. screaming females - boyfriend
8. kurt vile - freak train
~~9. marine girls - in love~~
~~9. beat happening - i spy~~
9. the fall - oh! brother
10. the smiths - still ill
11. sort sol & lydia lunch - as she weeps
12. devo - uncontrolable urge
13. woods - holes

romeo void - never say never

("teenage caveman" isn't on youtube so instead this is "bad seeds")

girls - lust for life (dir. aaron buttig / all the versions of this video are amazing)

(leonard cohen "is this what you wanted?" isn't here. this is nina simone covering "suzanne")

screaming females - boyfriend

kurt vile - freak train

sort sol & lydia lunch

devo - uncontrolable urge
this bitch talks too much

tattoo

2009-10-29T01:59:00.001-07:00

Tattoo
by Wallace Stevens

The light is like a spider.
It crawls over the water.
It crawls over the edges of the snow.
It crawls under your eyelids
And spreads its webs there--
Its two webs.

The webs of your eyes
Are fastened
To the flesh and bones of you
As to rafters of grass.

There are filaments of your eyes
On the surface of the water
And in the edges of the snow.

depths

2009-10-27T19:22:00.000-07:00

fillings in notebooks /
i need more fillings in my teeth

you gonna be at the vice thing on halloween?
i had really wanted to see phil elvrum at market hotel. maybe ill still figure that out. the little prince wasn't really going anywhere as a costume idea/ need to think up a replacement fast.
tryna get some xxxxxxxxx too. i feel a smile.

trying to make a list of thoughtful ways to waste my own time.......

smells

2009-10-27T02:51:00.000-07:00

sometimes, without warning or clear cause, i smell you. it's cheap.
like hamster shavings, sweat, your parent's house, old spice. and an ounce of something on fire.

poverty

2009-10-27T00:33:00.000-07:00

1998. Watching this music video alone in my room was probably my first sexual experience.

the new yorker

2009-10-24T23:02:00.000-07:00

I never used to read the New Yorker, but I do now. I did today.

Often, I do not understand the cartoons.

o

2009-10-14T15:06:00.000-07:00

i miss him,

i miss myself

JOE BRAINARD

2009-10-12T23:18:00.000-07:00

Joe Brainard is the best thing that's happened to me this month.

I love him, the "I Remembers", and of course, the Nancys

doubt

2009-10-10T16:10:00.000-07:00

does this look like Woody Allen or Andy Warhol to you?

-Sarah C

last season

2009-10-09T21:18:00.000-07:00

as close to exactly one year ago as I can be

October 2008

dedication

2009-10-09T19:36:00.001-07:00

linus

2009-10-09T19:24:00.000-07:00

I don't believe in love.

Yo no creo en amor.

oui

2009-10-09T18:54:00.000-07:00

Grates, October 2009

mugri

2009-10-09T18:04:00.000-07:00

Service, September 2009

murray

2009-10-09T18:00:00.000-07:00

Murray, August 2009

This is Joe's dog Murray. He needs help brushing his hair.

of recent

2009-10-09T09:46:00.000-07:00

losing a friend
not having a ride
self-absorbed
baking things to make the air smell better
hurrying and waiting
talking to jilda
where is my line
should i stay
and wait for your letter
you don't know me anymore
hollow sirens
severe faced witch
i left our topless pumpkins out in the rain, surely they have rotted
we will just have to make new ones

i hope that black lipstick is made out of something toxic

we are one step closer to an aids vaccine but i still write about microbials

Calm

2009-10-06T10:51:00.001-07:00

I just want to read and write and
be calm.
be closer to something like perfect.

why does pee wee herman wear lipstick?

2009-10-03T16:38:00.000-07:00

FREE ROMAN POLANSKI

2009-09-28T15:20:00.000-07:00

this is my song-

If I could picket the world right now, I would.

If I could promise you that the adventure would be fun-

I would do that too.

Baby, I'm finally gonna pay that ticket today. Even though I don't want to. Don't want to step on another bus. Ride it into somewhere that I don't want to be.

A life without dreams is _____?

work & play

2009-09-26T22:42:00.000-07:00

Here are some pictures from the other night @ Clayton Patterson's opening w/ ALIFE. Congrats Clayton, you are the best.

heeeeey Raf

I bought a bag of candy corn this morning at Rite-aid. It was 1/2 off of 99 cents. I have a strong feeling that it is expired, but there is no real way of knowing with the seasonal candy that you want around for all year.

kiss the rings

2009-09-21T04:53:00.000-07:00

time is a wonderful healer, my friend.

l'shana tova

2009-09-18T17:35:00.000-07:00

my celebration; listening to kasper hauser gonna smoke a spliff and then chew a piece of trident

l'shana tova

leaving tomorrow to a secret space in a big open field

can you tell the difference between a sunset and a sunrise in a photograph?

green weiner

2009-09-16T22:54:00.000-07:00

Seriously bumming. The only cure (besides working) is getting laid. Specifically, by Adam Green. I wouldn't want him to talk before or after, that would ruin it.

I might be moving back to ATL. If it does indeed come to that, it would mean giving up this fun thing I've got going at the UN. But then I think in Atlanta I would adopt a puppy and work on getting a car.

I am reading Sei Shonagon's "Hateful Things". I notice she left out unsatisfying compromises (like the one above). While it may be written in the definition that compromises mean giving up something that you want, unsatisfying compromises are truly he most hateful things of all.

Here are some gems she does include:

"An elderly person warms the palms of his hands over a brazier and stretches out the wrinkles. No young man would dream of behaving in such a fashion; old people can really be quite shameless."
"One has been foolish enough to invite a man to spend the night in an unsuitable place--and then he starts snoring."
"One has gone to bed and is about to doze off when a mosquito appears, announcing himself in a reedy voice. One can actually feel the wind made by his wings and, slight though it is, one finds it hateful in the extreme."
"Sometimes one greatly dislikes a person for no particular reason--and then that person goes and does something hateful."

It is so strange and wonderful when the world quietly unveils the littlest improvements. A bathroom tile has been missing forever in this spot. I came back and it has been discreetly replaced.

I vow not to fall asleep in the daylight for a while.

fxltr

2009-09-12T01:09:00.000-07:00

made it back to new york

so tired

interview with UN today

was wonderful

finally

have a job now

but still need other ones.

so happy

going to fall back to sleep

my first meeting is monday at 11AM.

lets go shopping for blazers

embarrassment is a fallacy

2009-09-06T08:27:00.000-07:00

I think the rats really are getting bigger.

The only time/way it seems to work is as a means of occupying my hands for the awkward hour when the music is slow or no one is talking.
how I look in a mirror, the way I move, finish stories or remember facts.

Sarah Castronovo

J. Penry

I was working on a revision of an essay about the first time I didn't remember how I got somewhere. What it's like to be 16 and wake up in a place you've never been before and don't recognize.

It's an old story and I have hardly any more perspective now.

I don't know how I feel about writing guides or styles of how-tos, but back in New York, I am reading The Best Creative Nonfiction, vol 1. After that I want to finish Lopate's 'Art of the Personal Essay' in its entirety. Maybe after I finish up those anthologies I can figure out what it is I liked about this essay before I started writing it. I like the disjunction in the things I say. I just want to write for disaffected teenagers that read books and know how to drive fast.

i hate you

2009-09-03T13:28:00.000-07:00

I am at my parent's house in Georgia now. For Labor Day and foot surgery. I am in the back yard on the computer, Esteban is staring me down from across the lawn. He is not interested in my existence.

Dear Applicant,
This is an automated email confirmation that we received your submission. Please be advised that due to the high volume of applicants, we will only be able to contact candidates whose skills and background best fit the needs of the open positions. After reviewing your resume, if we find you may be a fit for the position for which you have applied, a Human Resources representative will be in touch.
Thank you for your interest in The Museum of Modern Art!
Sincerely,
MoMA Jobs

summer reading

2009-09-03T02:49:00.000-07:00

I am back in Atlanta.

Emma Goldman > Alix Kates Shulman.

Foot surgery.

Autumn.

Goals.

Maine.

Photographs of my foot.

Desperate postcard.

Peachless trees.

Lou.

Turning off my cell phone.

Not finishing the things I start.

no notes

2009-08-28T20:57:00.000-07:00

I may be getting a job at the UN, no joke. I find out on Monday. Even if I don't get it, I'm excited to get into the building and look around.

I don't think I've been there since I was a little kid, maybe not even then. Maybe it's just a place I wish I had visited as a child.

I fell in love with these things, but I wasn't taking notes as I was doing it. I can't tell you very good descriptions of what they are. Sorry.

through their hands, they shall learn

thanks for this, maxwell

breakfast

sea monster hobbes

sublime frequencies

if i can pay my rent this month, the next thing im gonna do is invest in a drug rug

and some lip liner

louise bourgeois

no wake. save the manatees.

i also fell for roosevelt franklin:

as sure as a moose likes moose-juice.

visitors

2009-08-25T16:21:00.000-07:00

Monica came back for a minute before leaving again. Now she is on a farm in Spain and I miss her. WWOOF.

backyard beets

This is Lindley holding Lazaro somewhere on Broadway.

Lindley is a photographer and also made these sites:

WE PROJECTS

THE ONES WE LOVE

WHERE WE'RE FROM

THE PHOTOGRAPHIC DICTIONARY

My favorite is 'the ones we love.' I like looking at the handwriting of photographers, especially those younger than me, and ones that claim to love their moms.

It has been a summer of breakups and downs and ups again. And now it is almost over.

mountain sides

2009-08-25T16:11:00.000-07:00

The whole world smelled like garbage today. But besides that everything was ok and the weather is getting better. My neck doesn't sweat as much while I am sleeping.

These are photographs from PA.

I visited Jody in the mountains and had the best time. He escorted me to the first wedding I have ever been to. After hours of drinking at the reception, I went to a casino and lost $10 on a digitized slot machine. Then the next day, hungover, we walked through the wet woods.

It looked like the Emerald City

There were thousands of these guys

Hi Jody

can you see the repairs in the sky?

2009-08-23T11:12:00.000-07:00

can you see the repairs in the sky?

monkeytown

2009-08-15T17:30:00.000-07:00

Monkeytown has to be the worst venue in Brooklyn. I showed up late and sat in the corner. A balding man was eating the worst smelling mini hamburgers and foie gras. It was gross.

Later I was drinking mezcal and dos equis. Today I'm kinda down.

Someone! Help me with indexhibit, please.

I'm trying to piece together a website. Slow it goes.

I dug through my external hard drive and found some movies of a road trip to Florida and when I first moved to New York. This is that.

my mentor

a dream

RAAAAAAAANDY - Cragslist

2009-08-12T19:54:00.000-07:00

I need to see this movie

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAA

email to my momma

2009-08-12T18:54:00.000-07:00

i dont have to respond to ridiculous emails anymore or have someone call me retarded at 9:30 in the morning.

it's a good thing that DP deleted my email account because i probably would have made a book out of the trash those people sent to me in the past month.

on the positive, I got to meet J Mascis and fan out in front of him.

so long for now, powerhouse.

summer pains

2009-07-14T22:32:00.000-07:00

these are the things i want in this moment.

while i am contemplating not liking my job, being homeless, and feeling like NYC is not where i want to be.

michael pollan's writing cabin

I was watching 'a room with a view'

2009-07-07T20:53:00.000-07:00

I owe you a thousand apologies

I don't

my foolish behavior

I believe it was my photographs you had thrown away

they were covered in blood

Thank you.

I don't.

(swelling strings)

liger beat

2009-06-28T19:03:00.001-07:00

I want to thank and congratulate and the nice LIGER BEAT ladies for their first printed issue. There should be more pictures of dicks floating around. I got a centerfold and lost it in the street.

LIGER BEAT!

thank you to Jah for spotting some visiting Icelanders. me, Gier, Eva.

--------------------------------------------------------------->

I finally got a job.

Thank you Michelle, Eddy, Brian, Keren, Axel and anyone who has ever said anything nice about me.

my friends...

nyphotofestival.com

vbs.tv

writegirl.org/

flavorpill.com/newyork

baby's first bike accident

2009-06-17T13:42:00.000-07:00

Last night I got my bike fixed by wonderful Joe at Baruch's clubhouse, home to his bike co-op and serves as Time's Up headquarters in Brooklyn. @ 99 S 6th.

Baruch's new project is TRAIF, for those special times you might have problems with your Hassid landlord or need legal advice concerning tenant's rights.

They have a chicken coop, Murray, the dog that looks like a mop, tons of bicycles, and really graphic painting of naked ladies giving head. Also free drinks and pizza. The bike works great and I rode it down Broadway back to my house.

ends

2009-06-09T15:22:00.000-07:00

B&S

Sarah C

GINA

TERRIBLE

2009-06-05T08:04:00.000-07:00

I'm off to the post office to mail a ton of letters. I am sorry if you are late getting what you didn't know you had coming to you.

-----

I worked at Book Expo America last weekend and it was pretty wonderful. Even though most things were free, it was mostly free garbage. In response, I stole liberally from the MoMA, TeNeues, New York Review of Books, and Penguin booths. I was working in the Children's / Young Adult section at a non-profit booth stationed right next to Highlights magazine. All the highlights salesmen were old men with wrinkly owl eyes. One offered to take me to his cabin the woods in Pennsylvania.

Tonight I will be volunteering at the Brooklyn International Film Festival at Powerhouse. Come visit me, please.

I am also dropping off my finished zine retitled 'things' at Printed Matter and ABC No Rio very very soon. I think it will be $3, you can also just ask me for one and I will give it to you.

i plea for tenderness

2009-06-04T08:49:00.000-07:00

I think I am a modern lover.

a plea for tenderness

-jonathan richman and the modern lovers

Hey girls, do you hate men?
Do you hate the earth?
Well I still see tenderness in your face
And innocence straight from infant days
And there must be tenderness deep inside
You're so cold, but it shows

You told me about school
I only want to know about you
And it hurts me now
And it scares me now
And now you know

But if you care about me
(Tell me now)
If I'm better than the wall
(Tell me now)
And if it's important when I touch your hand
Then you'd better
Tell me now

Well, now, I've just read some writers
From the old days
Because I knew, I knew that they'd understand
Because dignity, dignity and tenderness should apply
To modern romance
So I don't wanna know, I'm just not interested in your school
So I don't wanna know, I don't wanna hear about your stupid cats
(Or you're homework)
Just talk about love, or sex, or starving hearts, or just shut up
and I'll go

But if you care about me
(Tell me now)
If I'm better than the wall
(Tell me now)
And if it's important when I touch you're hand
(Tell me now)

And if it's important when I come to you're kitchen
When it's late at night and when it's cold at night
When it's dark outside, when it's cold outside
I wanna know if it's important when I touch your hand
when you're all alone
(Tell me now)
If you really want to talk to me
(Tell me now)
And if you're lookin for a lover
(Tell me now)
I mean, if you need a lover
(Tell me now)
If you're ready to be honest with a lover
(Tell me now)
If it's important when you're alone at night
And when it's cold at night and when it's dark at night
When it's cold outside when it's sad outside
And when I'm sad outside, by the streetlight
By your house and near your kitchen door
I'm stumped because I'm scared
Because I'm sad
Because it's cold at night
Because it's dark at night
And I'm alone at night
I'm so sad and I'm so scared
And I want to know, if you'll tell me
If you care about me
Then if you care about yourself
And if you'll stop taking drugs
And if you'll stop bein so hard
And if you'll stop being hard to talk to
And if you'll let me come inside
And I can talk to you
When it's dark at night
And when it's sad at night
And alone at night

I don't want to be alone at night
(Tell me now)
I don't want to be sad at night
(Tell me now)
I want to help you
When it's cold outside
When you're all around
When it's sad outside
I want you to tell me now
I can't wait another day
You gotta hurry
I can't wait another minute
It's now or never
It's now or never
You gotta tell
You gotta tell
You can't hide
Or take drugs
Or cigarettes
Or dark outside
Or cats
Or these other things that you use
So I can't see you clear
I want to see you clear
I want to talk to you now
You've got to be honest now
You've got to tell me now
If you care about me
Tell me now

Wait a minute, wait a minute
I want to say, I want to say somethin else now
Wait a minute
I want to show you that I understand you now
(This is the guy talkin to the girlfriend)
He's gonna show you, he's gonna show you that he understands the deepest darkest parts
When he says ...

He says I know how beautiful death is
And I know why you hate life
But I'm just a tender soul
So be glad you know

I want to tell ya
That all men are just tender souls
And be glad that you know

henry clay

2009-06-02T12:32:00.000-07:00

falling behind.

Thanks to some encouragement from Gina, I'm gonna make another zine: the next one is gonna be about American Civil War portraits and US statesmen from the early-mid 1800's. I want to compare the photographs with paintings:

Henry Clay

According to his wikipedia article: "Henry Clay, Sr. (April 12, 1777 – June 29, 1852) was a nineteenth-century American statesman and orator who represented Kentucky in both the House of Representatives and Senate. He served as Secretary of State from 1825 to 1829."

other things and recent events:

liquor shoes

eating a klondike bar in the shower

treehouses of the world

sitting in the park, workin' on a even tan

fighting

fish sandwiches

not fighting

cammisa goes to Berlin

some other things

summer mixes

'astral weeks'

today and tomorrow

2009-05-26T08:06:00.001-07:00

thanks to everyone who was part of, helped, or came out to graduation, the exhibition, and the festival at my house. NO thanks to the people that walked over the fire escape onto my neighbors house.

i think im going to retire the blog for a week or two. really, i have nothing to say or share. if you are lucky enough, you will be getting some mail soon. im going to work on that. and maybe take some pictures. i havnt used a camera in months.

now im going to just hang out with my new neighbors and their kitten.

i care because you don't

2009-05-23T06:52:00.000-07:00

hangover.

hungover.

listening to the allman brothers.

make the books and make the cake.

get the sunglasses and the strawberries.

cups/ forks/ rags/ balloons.

drink lots of water.

party today and tonight --->

good weather

best hits

cache$$

slasher risk

fluorescent vibes

(& other bands too)

sdeb

2009-05-19T00:59:00.000-07:00

Because I can not focus

I decided to clean up my bookmarks

I'll share the better parts

AAA

A Year in Love and Music, Jeffrey Lewis cartoon

Europa Film Treasures

Eyemaze

iheartphotograph

Jules & Jim (1962) Catherine and Albert's song

More soon

Periodic Table of Typefaces

Photos of TV

PSFK

Stefan Glerum: Crate Digging, Don't Do It!

Telescopic text

You fell asleep watching a dvd

Enjoy.

Now I am going to take a shower to try and take the sleep-itch away.

atreyu

2009-05-17T07:13:00.000-07:00

I'm still recovering from Friday night, the first time I went out in weeks. Saw Dan Deacon Ensemble and danced until my feet got bloody and then took my clothes off. Cammisa told me some girl said she wanted to punch me in the face. I couldn't hear her say that and just so I smiled and kept dancing.

There are pictures somewhere that I'm curious to find.

*****

I lost my favorite sweatshirt in the fucking computer lab (either 3rd or 4th floor). It is blue and smells terrible: like old spice, pastels, and spilled miso soup. Please contact me if you find it.

i feel like a dead battery without it

I am back to the lab for what I hope is the last time. No more speed, strictly tea.

jeans

2009-05-14T03:45:00.000-07:00

I wear jeans almost everyday and it has not held me back.

breakdown

2009-05-14T02:42:00.000-07:00

I called you because I was scared of dying and I was trying to /

trying not to throw up on my own stoop.

I couldn't find the keyhole in the lock

of the front door.

You didn't answer and still have not called me back.

It is too late now because my phone is off.

2/5 there

2009-05-12T21:47:00.000-07:00

I have only a handful of favorite photographers. It is a small and scattered group.

These artists are all intelligent and sincere. The photographs are excogitative and often include pieces of the artist's physical body or traces of its existence in the images. The work is not evidence of life or as a result of living, it is more.
My favorite photographers are perspectivists. Their work illustrates the many ways of seeing 'real' objects and the unlimited truths in our world. A photograph can offer the viewer many ideas or perspectives, but it can never give a definitive truth. Neither the photographer, subject or viewer has knowledge of the noumenon, the thing-in-itself.

My favorite photographers are transcendentalists.

Photography is less art and more science. The medium requires traveling to a destination and studying a particular subject. A talented photographer can study a subject's qualities that are not immediately apparent to the human eye. The best photographs are to be viewed slowly. Repeatedly. The most interesting photographs do not rely on shock or the allure of novelty. These images do not necessarily display a new subject to the viewer, but display the subject in a way that the viewer has rarely, if ever, seen before.

Consequently, this display opens a new realm of possible meanings, interpretations and actions in our world.

Jim Goldberg

We are a very emotional and tight family, 1979 Silver print 35.2 x 27.4 cm.

SAN FRANCISCO — "Manny loves me—but I am too strong to love him." ... "This photo makes me want to cry," 1982.
© Jim Goldberg

Francesca Woodman

Lee Friedlander is close to being a favorite, but he I don't think he is.

happy mothers day

2009-05-10T16:12:00.000-07:00

I am almost done with school (forever/ or for a very long time).
I am presenting my senior work on Wednesday! I have class up until the 18th which is my web design final presentation and radio documentary presentation.

Between essays, sound editing, printing and css coding, I've been working on my half of me and Monica's setlist for my SUMMERTTIME (no)BLUES PARTY/ FESTIVAL. The party has had too many names, but what to know is that it is on Saturday the 23rd and goes from 1pm until Sunday afternoon.
We already have something like 10 bands playing, mostly noise bands in the backyard starting Saturday afternoon, then when we start up again around 8 or 9 it will be in the basement.
My house is gonna fall down.

Monica and I wanted to break up the BK-centricity and all the noise, so we will be paying our respects to the dirty bits we came from---> MIA and ATL respectively. The setlist is gonna be heavy on southern rap throwbacks and dub (because its summertime.) I won't be saying anything else about it, but here is a preview of some jamz:

can't decide between this and "Chickenhead"

Hello tubetops.

"like Nermal from Garfield, you're kitten me"

now all I need is the Mali.

Do You Want To Know Us?

2009-05-10T07:32:00.000-07:00

Do You Want To Know Us?

group show by Jazmin Venus Soto

I will be in a showing MAY 22 and selling my zine

"Things I left at home that I needed today"

There is also an artist panel speaking at 66 W 12th St on the 4th Floor

the speakers are:::

Aurel Schmidt
Asher Penn
Ann Messner
Elizabeth DeMarray

The panel starts @ 6:30. the room isn't super huge, so you probably should RSVP to doyouwant.toknowus @ gmail.com

Other cool people showing work:

Ryan Naideau

Cammisa Forrest
Jazmin Venus Soto

Monica Uszerowicz

Sarah Castronovo

Xavier Veal/Gregg Cook

Horatio Baltz

Leah Meltzer
Ryan Whittier Hale
Jesse Hlebo

also gonna be there with stuff:

Gina Murdock

Geoff Kim

Maya Barrera Loeb
Emma Choy Brown
Naima Woods
Reni Washere
Paige Lipari

bits and pieces from "Things I left at home that I needed today"

2009-05-04T05:38:00.000-07:00

My ears hurt from not taking my headphones off for 12 hrs.

But they are not enough to keep the people out.

I am going to start wearing a surgical mask.

I've been drinking and working on lists with friends/

most of these I can not take credit for/

(please get a copy of the book when it comes out on the 22nd)

things I have lost

my bike

car in parking lot

sleep

friends

the other earring

colors with interesting names (mostly Michael)

sandal slip

reddish

double green

radio blue

laser teal
PINKPLE

bleen (Sarah)

tattoos I don't have

RUMOURS (fleetwood mac)

a parade of elephants

things I didn't like about you

you were too sensitive

you made me feel bad

you were gay

you were too scared to have an adventure

things I did like about you

your accent

your b.o

you defended me

you laughed too much

hire me
memories of yony
better kind of facebook

adderall

2009-05-02T18:00:00.000-07:00

DONT TALK TO ME FOR 2 WEEKS.

the innanet

2009-04-28T15:01:00.001-07:00

I'm taking a web design class this semester so I can have a portfolio website. It was a bad idea, it has never taken me so long to be mediocre at something before.

I've been making lists for a long time now. I kind of want to write about 40 blank lists and invite a bunch of girls over and make everyone sit in a real big circle. Then we would pass out the lists and everyone would have 60 seconds to write as many things as they could before switching with the person on their left.

I had help with this, you know who you are. maybe you are embarrassed.

maybe I am going to illustrate this.

things i didn't like about you:

you were short

you used paint palettes as ashtrays

you never made me anything, just talked about it

you smoked all my weed and then fell asleep

you broke my toilet

you didn't like my dog

things i did like about you:

you paid attention

you smelled my hair

you liked hammocks

we went on roadtrips

you wrote me a bad song - and a good one

you played chess

things to do at the beach

sleep

apply sunscreen

read a book

draw a cartoon

undo your top strap

dig a hole

eat a popsicle

drink a beer and hide it in the sand

favorite times to smoke a joint

during my lunch break/ down the street in front of the loading dock

walking to the train in the morning before everyone else is awake

while watching twin peaks

with group partners in 'radio documentary' class

actors who only play one character

whoopie goldberg

christian slater

arnold schwarzenneggah

keaneau

christopher lloyd

jennifer anniston

things that are overrated

miranda july

thick pancakes

the magnetic fields

cadbury eggs

cats

college?

granola

not ever leaving new york

names of ex-friends

Obie

Sara

Brittany

Amadi

Michael

Greg

Angad

things that are underrated

flossing

the bus system

things i have lost

subway card

ipod charger

my ability to read sarcasm

scabs

many movies/ more books

virginity

my favorite cookbook

$20 . definitely a lot more

half of both of my two front teeth

colors with interesting names including crayola names

ochre

cerulean

umber

ruby

peridot

cyan

lavender

atomic tangerine

pumpernickle

beaver

things life would be better without

the girl who thinks she is my boss, but absolutely is not

the hair that gets stuck in my mouth/ your mouth when we are kissing

rooms without windows

when you try and make those faces

things i left at home that i needed today

my notebook

overdue library book

headphones

my external hard drive

film

clean underwear

lunch money

feelings i get on the subway

nausea

a quietness

'shit, why did i have to see you here?'

'im stuck'

interested observation/ disinterested observation

routine

sticky feet

a dedication to vegetarianism

magazines i like

national geographic

capricious

n+1

found magazine

arthur magazine

things i want to do to my teacher

cut his hair

paint his toes

listen to him talk about whatever book he's reading

fog his glasses

end.

of me wasting time in the ucc

halloweeners

2009-04-27T09:43:00.000-07:00

Screamin. Bushwick. October 2008.

living stones: plants that look like pebbles

2009-04-27T09:36:00.000-07:00

Living Stones. October 2008.

PLANTS THAT LOOK LIKE PEBBLES!
Lithops Wikipedia
Colorado State Horticulture

big little

2009-04-27T09:32:00.000-07:00

August 2008.

heartbreaker

2009-04-21T21:11:00.000-07:00

HEARTBREAKER is finished. Below is a screen shot of one of the pages.

CLICK HERE TO SEE THE MAGAZINE

Thank you, Monica.

Thank you, Artun.

Congrats!

a poem

2009-04-21T11:26:00.000-07:00

a poem about a person

I like it when my cat watches me have sex
He is usually upstairs sleeping

on my roommate's bed

when I go looking for him
I take him under one arm and bring him into my room
I feed him
He is confused and stares at the bowl before he begins to eat
That’s when I close the door
J is already on my bed, adjusting my ipod. Something 70s and Brazilian starts playing
When I am on top and feeling everything—one hand on J’s shoulder, the other against the wall
I turn my body
My brown eyes meet his
Big and yellow and glowing in the dark

late announcements

2009-04-18T18:09:00.001-07:00

There are some things that you should know about. I'll try and be more on the ball about all this.

My friend Greg from the VBS times puts together this wonderful cinema/drinking series:

CINEMA 16 @ BELL HOUSE!
Sunday, April 19, 2009
6pm doors; 7pm show
The Bell House
(149 7th Street, Brooklyn, NY, 11215)

F Train to 4th Avenue
G train to Smith & 9th Street
M/R to 9th Street

$10 -- cheaper than a movie in the city!
Buy advance tickets

Free Red Stripe from 6pm-7pm

I'll see y'all tomorrow.

-----

This is a little on the late side but a while ago I met this sweet girl named Ani and she had a genuine idea --->

I couldn't make it to the opening this time around, but I'll definitely be there next time I'm going to try and put some of my photos up for sale, if that sounds appealing to anyone out there.

! Recession Art! Opening!

Saturday, April 18

closes April 23

6-10 PM

Brooklyn Artists Gym

168 7th St at Third Ave, third floor, 718-858-9069

go drink and listen to some music and look at some nice work

-----

Lastly, the delightful Maxwell Williams currated this a while ago. I was sad I missed the opening but I was in New Orleans at the time. Anyways, it is closing soon and everyone should go.

\/1R7U4L 1|\|$4|\|17'/

CINDERS GALLERY

103 Havemeyer St, Brooklyn, NY

cinders caption: "Curator Maxwell Williams buggin out"

brotherly love

2009-04-18T15:59:00.000-07:00

Dear Philadelphia,

I love your city, but I don't think there is enough Ben Franklin.

Love,

Emily

a disposable camera

2009-04-14T15:05:00.001-07:00

comic book

gina, my friend i met on the train

clayton and monica, going to be taken down upon request

morning after sleepover

friends

boney slug

with hair

and whiskers

hott stuffing in the middle

simon

accident

books love the kids

branch out

2009-04-12T18:36:00.000-07:00

I thought I would be using this to post new photos or writing. But mostly I just put up everyday's bullshit. It is so much easier, and probably more popular. Like this:

T.I., I love you. I got brains so good, you coulda sworn I gone to college. I am sad you are going to jail.
I hate clowns. The one on the left is Conrad Veidt LOOK.
But I like kids.

I need to branch out.
I know who all of you are, except the Brooklyns, which is all of you.

1 United States Brooklyn, New York
2 United States Brooklyn, New York
3 United States Brooklyn, New York
4 United States Atlanta, Georgia
5 United States Brooklyn, New York
6 Unknown ?
7 United States Brooklyn, New York
8 Unknown ?
9 United States Brooklyn, New York
10 Belgium Brussels, Brussels Hoofdstedelij...
11 Unknown ?
12 United States Rhinebeck, New York
13 United States Brooklyn, New York
14 United States Brookline, Massachusetts
15 United States Norcross, Georgia
16 United States 1,241
17 United States Brooklyn, New York
18 United States Brooklyn, New York
19 United States Brooklyn, New York
20 United Kingdom Blackburn, Blackburn with Darwen
21 Portugal Loures, Lisboa
22 United States Brooklyn, New York
23 United States Chicago, Illinois
24 United States Middletown, New York
25 Germany 3,838

neely

2009-04-12T17:26:00.000-07:00

Romantic love was invented to manipulate women -Jenny Holzer

Is this true?

No.

My brain is flaking.

My body is sore like I went running; I definitely did not. Instead of going Upstate, I found another way not to. I think it had to do with the rain.

I did buy heavy bags of potting soil at Home Depot and dragged it all back home. I saw some guy with dreadlocks that touched the cement floor when I was buying a handsaw. I wish I could have remembered his name, or at least something else about him besides his hair, from when we worked together at the library. So we just kind of nodded when we saw eachother.

I am almost embarrassed, but not

by this-

I was in my bed: in front of a 10-ft window with no curtain, and I watched 'We Are Wizards' on Hulu. The entire thing. It is a few years old and all about 'wizard rock', bands with HP themes. Harry and the Potters, Draco and the Malfoys, the Whomping Willow, etc. All their fans are 7-year-olds or young and greasy girls, which is kind of amazing. To be musician with a predefined shelf-life like that. Like an open jar of mayonnaise.

But Brad Neely was also in the movie. He said lots of funny things and was proud (and probably lying) when he said he had never read the books. Neely said he liked the movies a lot, mostly HP no. 2. He rescripted the movies and made 'adult audio tracks' to play against the muted movie if you time it just right.

I still havn't seen these- maybe one day soon, maybe the next time it rains.

Before you watch that, you should read this. I used my incredible skills honed from writing out Stephen Malkmus and Mike Watt transcriptions for VBS to capture this glory:

"Dear Diary,

Sometimes I think that this planet is owned by devils,

Sometimes I feel like my friends don't even know who I am

And my family belongs to some other me.

Sometimes, I need to be one with nature,

I want to frolic with the polycorns

and run amongst the braintrees, in the brain forest.

So I go to the city park by the lake.

Walking potion: 10 parts sugar, 90 parts whiskey.

If it's cold out, I take a bag of chowder,

And in the summer, I take a bag of banana chowder.

Once there, I look for the dream girls,

And I see the day-mares

And the talking shadows, bonding over disgusting things.

I see the perfects, and the lay-downs, and the hunched-ups.

I watch the followers looking for punch meat (?) ,

And I notice the pansexuals, wiggling down the lane,

with their shades on.

Sometimes, if I'm fast enough, I catch a glimpse of the brainfucker,

Just fuckin the shit out of everyone- and we don't even know it.

But mostly, I look for the dream girls,

You know, if you try sometimes,

You just might find, get what you want.

I have a big coat, with big pockets.

Sometimes, kittens get in there,

It's cool with my as long as they keep their hooksocks curled.

I look for wizard turds in the forest because I was once told they could be rolled into gold.

Sometimes I go to the lake and sing songs to the lake about the lake,

Once, a goose clapped.

Today on the road I saw something important,

I like to think they died while hugging, and that a person hadn't arranged them afterwards.

I found a soft tree and leaned up there, until the stars put on their make up.

I calmed down and focused my Chi, it's good to have a Chi hammer on the ready.

Then, I saw a second important thing that night, hmm.

You know, I felt pretty wise.

Shit matters, even if you can't figure it out,

Even if we are ruled by devils,

Even if my days don't mean anything.

I just hope that I die while hugging

And not while in a wine drinking contest."

all things must pass

2009-04-10T10:52:00.000-07:00

____ the open windows that I have closed. But first, I took a picture of the view.

Not everything that can be counted counts, and not everything that counts can be counted.
Albert Einstein (1879-1955)

-----
Tommy Wiseau

-----

All Thing Must Pass all morning that was really the afternoon in disguise.

-----

please please please be in Socrates

-----

MONOTONE Carl Sandberg

THE monotone of the rain is beautiful,
And the sudden rise and slow relapse
Of the long multitudinous rain.

The sun on the hills is beautiful,
Or a captured sunset sea-flung,
Bannered with fire and gold.

A face I know is beautiful--
With fire and gold of sky and sea,
And the peace of long warm rain.

job applications

2009-04-09T15:22:00.000-07:00

Because of all the things happening here lately I think I deserve to leave Brooklyn soon. I want to see California from the driver's seat of a car. And probably because it goes against everything I am thinking, I started applying for real jobs in and around New York for the summer.

planning coverletters and submissions to:

Brooklyn Rail

National Geographic

Capricious

Creative Time

Harvest Works

freewilliamsburg

ETCETCETC

I also want to start volunteering at the Lower East Side Print Shop in May.

Saturday I'm leaving Brooklyn and going upstate. No matter what.

GATES SALON TONIGHT

waterloo sunsets

2009-04-07T08:45:00.000-07:00

Taken from a mediocre essay written in Spring 09.

------------------------------

Ray Davies, what do you mean to voyeurism and what does voyeurism mean to you?

But I don’t need no friends, as long as I gaze on Waterloo sunset, I am in paradise. -Waterloo Sunset, The Kinks

... after glimpsing a colorful boy running down the streets. The boy was chasing a large red ball that was propelling itself down an alleyway and away from a grubby mob of French-spouting children. The boy was the balloon’s friend, but the other children were jealous and chased the balloon and tried to harm it by throwing stones. Eventually the red balloon meets a crowd of other Technicolor balloons and together they float away in silent concert to the top of the sky.

That was the first time I saw Albert Lamorisse's 1956 The Red Balloon (Le ballon rouge.)

Yet, this is my personal account of a sentimental attachment to a work of art—the love of a spectator. I am a pedestrian, a student, an amateur photographer and an audience member. What is more interesting to analyze is the indissoluble and unexplainable relationship between an artist and their creation. Just as I have found my connection to The Red Balloon to be extraordinarily rare, it is the same for artists.

...It’s the artworks that are never completed to satisfaction, or never seen shown before the death of an artist that have the most significance in one's life.

...Ray Davies songs are short, at around 2:30 and combine definitively '60s British electrified-rock with head-bobbing pop rhythms. His work uses personal narrative to capture the smallest, but most enjoyable moments in of life: the scenes we witness from a window, meeting a mysterious woman, getting over a lover or watching the daily rush hour traffic when you are not a part of it. These songs are in fact stories about the small minutes of happiness, infatuation and nostalgia that make up our lives.

“Waterloo Sunset” is written from the point of view of a man staring out the window onto the Waterloo Bridge connecting the East and West sides of London over the River Thames. Davies sings, but I don’t need no friends, as long as I gaze on Waterloo sunset, I am in paradise. He spies a young couple, Terry and Julie, and everything in the world seems to be at peace as long as they are in love, as they are in that moment.

By the end of the song we do not learn who Terry and Julie are, or if they are even real. It is not necessary to know the identity of the lovers in order to understand the bliss of their meetings. Davies has offered many contradicting identities for Terry and Julie, recorded in interviews and his autobiography. ...But the song is widely thought to be about Terence Stamp and Julie Christie, British film stars that were once a high profile romantic couple—even Christie acknowledges that the song is about her and Stamp. Could be the mystery that preserves this song as a timeless story about finding connection in the London’s swarming metropolis? If so, is Ray Davies doing a service to his work by protecting the subject’s true identities?

The cynic might hear “Waterloo Sunset” as a mundane observation of everyday urban traffic patterns. But the song has been proclaimed “a masterpiece” by The Who’s Pete Townshend and "the most beautiful song in the English language" by music critic Robert Christgau. ...In 1985, Return to Waterloo, a soundtrack to a self-directed and written film of the same name was released by Davies. The title is a direct reference to the 1967 song, but the story takes a more dystopian perspective on London street life, while still playing on public voyeurism, imagination, exploring a relationship to the city of London. Davies’ song "Return to Waterloo" concerns the struggles an aging man’s dreams of a return to the world of his youth. Another 15 years later, in 2000, Davies published Waterloo Sunset Stories, a collection of short stories titled exclusively after Kinks songs. The autobiographical stories revolve around an aged rock musician, Les Mulligan, and a cynical promoter planning his comeback.

...I have experienced unexplainable echoes of art, film, and literature—a result of what I can only assume is a deep personal connection to a work. Such as my love for an old French children’s movie about a boy chasing a balloon, or the songs that stick themselves to the insides of all our heads, or the books we continue to read over and over. Artists have similar relationships to their own work, as there are enduring forces that connect the creator his creation. For some, a particular story is perennially created, expanded, destroyed, and redigested over an entire career. Artists are able to dedicate themselves to a story with many endings, just as Davies is connected to “Waterloo Sunset”. ...

crazy arms

2009-04-07T07:23:00.001-07:00

happy birthday, dad.

i took these a while ago. i have a ton, but i didnt use a tripod. im going to crop them down and edit it into a grid. final product ill post up later.

chinese sleeping

2009-04-07T07:10:00.000-07:00

I found this mystery note the morning after Valentines. Thank you, Mystery T.

For the first time in years, I need to give some credit to the New School. I got randomly chosen to be apart of a survey group and 'as a gift for my participation' I get $25 at Murray's Bagels. I'm not going to think about how much money I've spent on school.

Manly house guests:

sparks on the tracks

2009-04-06T06:00:00.000-07:00

I am worried about graduation and how much is going on, but also how much isn't going on. I don't remember the last time I felt like I accomplished something.

Senior thesis work needs to get done. Get started, really. I am making a book out of collected bits of the summer. I am learning more about watercolors and guasch over xeroxes.

It is raining outside right now and I want to stay here and listen to the cars driving on the wet road outside my window. Or watch the sparks on the tracks as the trains goes by the other side of the station.
I don't want to respond to a certain professor's rude emails about why I didn't come to class. I didn't go because I didn't go. I never got the chance to watch Céline and Julie Go Boating on account of all the nonsense that's been happening lately.

E is the most forgettable letter.

singing islands

2009-04-05T12:37:00.000-07:00

What is a singing island?

A name taken mostly from Phil Elverum's (The Microphones) Song Islands album.

It is also a piece of a Korewori proverb I read in my favorite section of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The New Galleries for Oceanic Art is behind Egypt, and also faces Central Park. It is filled with wooden canoes, shields, and statues of primordial ancestors from Polynesia, Micronesia, and Papua New Guinea. All of the bodies of the statues are tall and thin, filled with holes, and covered with mythological animals and painted abstract designs. I am going to try and go back this week and find the quote I read about the 'songs of the islands' and take pictures of the ceiling. The center of the ceiling is covered with a tide of wooden panels that were once part of a ceremonial house.

Title Canoe Prow
Date 19th–early 20th century
Culture/Style Middle Sepik, Iatmul
Geography Papua New Guinea, Middle Sepik River
Medium Wood, cowrie shells
Dimensions L: 71 1/2 in. (181.6 cm)
Credit Line The Michael C. Rockefeller Memorial Collection, Purchase, Nelson A. Rockefeller Gift, 1955
Accession Number 1978.412.705

"Crocodiles play a central role in the art and culture of the Iatmul people. According to one Iatmul creation account, an ancestral crocodile was responsible for forming the land. In the beginning, the earth was covered by a primordial ocean, into whose depths the crocodile dived. Reaching the bottom, it brought up on its back a load of mud, which became an island when it surfaced. From that island, the land grew and hardened, but it continues to rest on the back of the ancestral crocodile, which occasionally moves, causing earthquakes. Both now and in the past, the prows of most sizeable canoes are carved, as here, in the form of a crocodile. The scale of the present work indicates that it probably adorned a large war canoe, capable of holding from fifteen to twentyfive men. These large canoes, hollowed from a single massive log, were also used for trading and fishing expeditions. Although canoes are no longer used in warfare, contemporary Iatmul carvers continue to make large examples for use in trade and general transportation."

It could also be a moment like lighting a cigarette from a stove burner while it is still in your mouth and simultaneously catching your hair on fire and then laughing about it with your neighbor who did the same thing.

Now you're gone, I won't fall, fall in the fire
Oh no, I am lacking, I want what I see

rough

2009-04-04T12:40:00.001-07:00

nypd

2009-04-02T03:34:00.001-07:00

who are the police?

cops banging on my window woke me up at 6.04am this morning.
looking for a fugitive.
they didn't leave a card or anything so i called 911.
and then 311/ the 81st precinct

and i know that they probably weren't cops at all and i know you can buy fake badges at pawn shops.

HEY MA

2009-04-01T12:24:00.000-07:00

HEY MA, IM PREGNANT

APRIL FOOLS

cant stop watching this. THOSE NAILS.

the dirty pictures i draw in class

2009-03-29T20:57:00.001-07:00

This is what I am doing when I look like I am not paying attention to you.

(Convulsive Transcendence)
(Aesthetics)
(History of Documentary Film)
a pipecleaner.
i copied instead of a book.
(Statistics or Music & Film)

For a while there I was working with a Tristan and Isolde theme
VERA ZOLBERG (Art, Culture, Society)

boxes

2009-03-29T20:52:00.000-07:00

there are good mistakes too

thank you

2009-03-29T13:12:00.000-07:00

I am embarrassed for myself

too bad I can't be like them,

materialism

2009-03-26T13:45:00.000-07:00

this is my $wish collage

i made it a few weeks ago when i was feeling shitty

and i felt much better

my friends, my haus

2009-03-26T12:16:00.000-07:00

Remember that last minute show at my house.

CHECK IT:

http://www.imposemagazine.com/throw-noise-shows-in-your-basement/14897/

In conclusion,

Beauties. My favorite is the picture of those four kittens with a Martiny in the background.

MATH TATTOOS are the way to go, I have always felt this way.

Right on! to all Corey Bauer/Cryptic Carousel projects.

And I hope you are as happy as we are.

Some lovely boys from London at my house right now and Mr. Jody Buchman (and his buttcrack) are coming back into town from the Poconos on Saturday!) Let's do all our homework first, work on some writing, and then dye some 40ozs blue

hey

2009-03-26T12:07:00.000-07:00

I like you very much

"fireworks" lyrics

2009-03-24T23:07:00.000-07:00

I am going to die one day, and I don't want it to be overnight in a library.

"Fireworks" off Animal Collective's Strawberry Jam is one the best songs I know, mostly because of the lyrics.

I feel like if I were a songwriter, I would have wanted to write a song like Fireworks. Then when I heard it, I would have to become the person that cleans out the cages at the zoo. The most perfect thing I could have ever wanted to create would have already been done by someone else and 1000x's better.

Bedroom dancing. Because I love the words so much, I have done heavy googling of the lyrics so I could print them out, make hundreds of copies and toss them (thoughtfully) into the streets. But it's some bullshit that if you go online, ALL THE LYRICS SITES ARE WRONG. It's a fuckin conspiracy.

So I have listened to this golden jam again and again just to promote the correct translation of Avey Tare's poetry.

Now it's day, I've been trying to get that taste off my tongue
I was dreaming of just you, now our cereal, it is warm
Attractive day in the rubble of the night from before
Now I can't walk in a vacuum, I feel ugly, feel my pores
It's the trees of this day that I do battle with for the light
Then I start to feel tragic, people greet me, I'm polite

"What's the day?" "What are you doing?"
"How's your mood?" "How's that song?"

Man it passes right by me, it's behind me, now it's gone
And I can't lift you up cause my mind is tired
It's family beaches that I desire
A sacred night, where we'll watch the fireworks
The frightened babies poo
They've got two flashing eyes and they're colored why
They make me feel that I'm only all I see sometimes.

I've been eating with a good friend who said
"A Genie made me out of the earth's skin"
But in spite of her, she is my birth kin,
she spits me out in her surly blood rivers
All the people life lurking in dominions of a hot Turk dish (?)
If elephants are reaching for our purses, meet me after the world cause you know (with the shivers.)

"What's the day?" "What you doing?"
"How's your food?" "How's that song?"

Man it passes right by me, it's behind me, now it's gone
And I can't lift you up cause my mind is tired, it's family beaches that I desire
That sacred night where we watched the fireworks
They frightened the babies and you know they've got two flashing eyes
And if they are color blind, they make me feel, that you're only what I see sometimes.
And I can't lift you up cause my mind is tired, it's family beaches that I desire
That sacred night where we watched the fireworks
They frightened the babies and you know they've got two flashing eyes
And if they are color blind, they make me feel, that I'm only what I see sometimes.

editor's note: oh shit. instead of taking my word for it, you could also just go here: lyricalcollective

CAPTURED

2009-03-24T09:06:00.000-07:00

My friend Monica works for Clayton Patterson and has been editing the companion book to the CAPTURED documentary. She is amazing and has been working real hard. So you had better get your hands on a copy when it comes out and if you can make it to this screening too, cool.

Kahlil Gibran

2009-03-23T16:28:00.000-07:00

About a year ago I found a copy of The Prophet by Kahlil Gibran on an empty shelf. I read it on the L train going from my old apartment to school in about 20 minutes and it was the most I've ever learned from any subway ride. I don't know when the edition I have was made, but I know Gibran did all the illustrations on the inside and the one on the cover. I want the engraving on the cover engraved on my skin.

------

I've been feeling low lately for trying new things and messing them up, and overexposing film. The next few days I'll be in the computer lab, so expect some new photos at least, even if they are shitty- like one of the dog below.

This is my old friend's dog. His name is Lucky.

Notes from notebooks;

2/09 I stopped being able to understand sarcasm. When did this happen, what have I missed?

8/08 I had two campers, they were brothers, named Jupiter and Mars Nguyen. They had another brother named Neptune who I never met. Someone told me their dad worked for NASA.

9/08 The sound of a room full of halogen light bulbs. Flipping all the switches at together.

3/09 Fat ringed fingers. He looks like a cat playing with an invisible string when he talks.

the beginning

2009-03-23T15:56:00.000-07:00

I don't think my senior thesis is working out how I want it to. The content and idea won't change, but instead of making large prints and concentrating mostly on the photogaphy I think I will try and bind a book- and not do what I usually do (taking dollar books from the Strand and photo-mounting my own images on the pages) but instead really binding it well and stronger and with more text. Most of my photos from last week are very overexposed. Below are some paragraphs introducing the House of Studies and Einstein. I'll add more later. The photos are of Nygel, a canal and the Six Flags sign outside of Einstein.

I opened my eyes in the dark, a minute before the alarm clock broke the quiet and rolled off my plastic-coated twin mattress pad. The wasps buzzed around the frayed screen of my open second floor window. A leaking sink stuck out of the wall near the foot of my bed, I turned its steel handle and the faucet blasted hard water against my hands. For the past three years, local newspapers had been telling the public to avoid drinking tap water. I raised my palms to my face and let the cold water drip down my face and neck into my t-shirt. The heat outside would dry my clothes within a half an hour. I changed into my uniform and met the other who were waiting outside on the steps, in a loose half-circle. We sat silently before boarding the vans heading to our separate campsites.

+++++++++++

To the farthest east of the city, outside of the St. Bernard Parish, is The Einstein Charter School. On the outside, the building is layered with grey painted rectangles covering graffiti on the blue brick pillars. The lopsided roof is missing shingles and the school seems to have fallen out of the sky and into an overgrown field. The grass behind the main building is pockmarked with Cisco wine bottles, foil hot fry bags, lost socks, deflated basketballs and moldy wet mattresses. Neighborhood kids and teenagers play games on these abandoned mattresses, jumping from one onto the other until they get bored.

The football goal posts stand at a 50-degree angle from the wind force of the storm three years before. Beyond the field is a labyrinth of small, one-story houses, some trailers are still parked in front, and some houses still have the red or orange crosses and numbers spray painted beside the front door.

This elementary and middle school building was home to an AmeriCorps summer camp during the hot vacation months the kids were supposed to have away from classrooms. The program was free for low-income families with the exception of a $15 fee for three Gulfsouth Youth Action Corps t-shirts that the campers would never wear. Inside, the heat of the school rose, and the humid air was thick with smells of mold, urine, warm pencil shavings and sour milk. The fluorescent lights in the wide main hallway were kept off during May, June, July and August to keep the building cooler. It didn’t seem to be working. At each end of the hallway were thick metal doors, wrapped in unlocked chains; the daylight came inside, highlighting the bottom ½ inch where the door did not reach the floor.

fuckin busy

2009-03-22T12:27:00.000-07:00

sorrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrry world, ive been fuckin busy.

i just finished up in new orleans. why are americorps people are so much cooler and more attractive when you don't have to work with them anymore? ill post bahama and new orleans pictures as soon as i get around to it.

also, who is maggie lee and how does she know all my friends?

My dad's gun

2009-03-18T18:19:00.000-07:00

My dad has a gun that I've never seen.
I just found the bullets on my bookcase.

missing monica

2009-03-18T13:27:00.000-07:00

I can only do so much.

So all the flights to New Orleans are booked for today. That's what happens when you become dependent on flying stand-by on AirTran X-Fare. Bummerrrrr. I have to be at the airport at 7:30 tomorrow morning and I don't want to sleep tonight.

I haven't done enough. I never do.

basement flyer

2009-03-18T07:49:00.000-07:00

<3>

I'm going to New Orleans tonight. Thank you to Katherine for hosting my body @ your house!

I wish I was driving from Atlanta, I need a good car trip. Next time. Gonna go get some film developed and I'll scan that when I get back to NY. If anyone knows how to upload music to this, let me know. I've got some gems to share.

being away

2009-03-16T17:00:00.000-07:00

I've been away, culturing tan lines. When one thing disappears, something better takes its place.
Greetings from the Bahamas. Tomorrow, I will leave for New Orleans and then soon to New York.

Things should stop being called 'new' once they stop being that way.

The Flower Girls are having a show WEDNESDAY @ the Lafayette House (my house.) If I get a flyer, I'll post it. I won't be there, but you should be!

Go see BEST HITS and lots of other wonderful surprises [curlerrs, dANA, GDFX, Teenage Souls!!.]

no pussy

2009-03-09T03:39:00.000-07:00

New Orleans, July 2008

Click on the photo.

I feel the same way.

instant coffee

2009-03-09T03:28:00.000-07:00

I did not sleep and there was no reason, today will be a long one. It's going to be raining.

"St. Elmo's Fire" Brian Eno

"You Still Believe in Me" The Beach Boys

"Baltimore Is the New Brooklyn" JC Brooks & the Uptown Sound
~For Tiffany~

can this be compared to Lolita? it just was.

birthdays

2009-03-08T19:47:00.001-07:00

It is not my birthday, not even close.

But it has been or will be many other birthdays. I have not forgotten, even if you think I have or will.

I am trying to think of the perfect present.

les ballons

2009-03-08T19:35:00.001-07:00

Balloons

September 2008

18

2009-03-05T20:05:00.001-08:00

I have this thing for 18 year olds.

I really like any combination of acne, pink hair, and ripped jeans. I think we could listen to Black Dice, smoke weed, watch cartoons and lay on the floor together and stare at the ceiling.

Wearing sneakers and greasy t-shirts and eating potato chips.

i want to watch the watchmen with you

I recently read Lolita for the first time. I thought it was pretty good, but the thoughts I have are not at all like HH.

INTRUDER ALERT

2009-03-05T19:44:00.000-08:00

what passes for urgency?

My mom called me today to tell me what a good day she was having. Partly what did it was getting these flyers in the mailbox.

Then she e-mailed me these scans and we had a laugh about the misspelled words and emphasis of 'our basement!!!'

Josef Koudelka

2009-03-05T15:59:00.000-08:00

Assignment for Adv NF class.

I compiled some Koudelka photographs to go with this essay.

Asleep on a Burlap Sack,

Josef Koudelka

Who took these photographs? And what do they mean? This man has traveled. How old is he? Who are these strange people? Are they his friends? His family maybe?

We come to knowing a man by seeing the places he has been. While we never view his face, we see pieces of his body. An outstretched fist, displaying a wristwatch before an empty street. It is 6:00 PM in Prague, 1968. Flip ahead and it is 10:38, somewhere in Spain, 1976. We see him in a pair of rolled up, loose bluejeans and creased leather shoes, worn from travel. He is resting his legs against the trunk of a young tree. We see the simplicity of his lifestyle in an unfolded newspaper, the International Herald Tribune, used as a plate. He eats a baguette with cheese and an apple sliced horizontally, revealing the centrical star in holding the seeds.

He is a man who lived without a home for over half his life. He is a photographer.

When Josef Koudelka ended a career as an engineer in Bratislava, he let the right side of his brain grow over the left. He began his career in photography taking photographs of Czech absurdist theater performances, including, Alfred Jarry’s Ubu Roi. But his real interest was in the Gypsies. He explored what was then the lower part of his country, Slovakia and learned the language, played their music and listened quietly to their stories. He was a gypsy, sleeping on a burlap sack on the floors of acquaintances and waking early to catch the light.
One day, with no warning, Prague was invaded. Josef took over two thousand exposures of crowds, violence, streets, rebellion, machinery, and anger. His photographs were published anonymously and he left his home for a nomadic life to be had elsewhere. He traveled over Europe, and the rest of the world, finding and documenting other exiles. He did not return to Prague for over 30 years.
Photography is unlike other artistic mediums because it is influenced by technology, unlike painting or sculpture which has changed very little in the past hundreds of years. Painters and sculptors use the same instruments and can ignore the digitized world, while photographers cannot. Josef Koudelka remained devoutly loyal to his Leica 25mm for most of his life until 1986, when he traded it for a panoramic camera. I was born in 1987, and for my own unexplainable reasons, I gravitate to his Leica photographs. As a collection, these photographs show the movements of one man tracking the diasporas of Europe, carrying the weight of a German steel devices with precise lenses, and rolls of sensitive film in his backpack.
This technology was the most valuable thing Josef Koudelka ever owned. The most fascinating thing about Koudelka is his ability to move. He never put down roots, he never paid rent, not until a few years ago when he finally purchased an apartment in Paris and one in Prague. He is 70 years old and still taking photographs.
The French journalist Bernard Cuau wrote of his friend, “He is the one who lives in dangerous places and who heads for uncertain destinations. He has been an exile... and as a matter of principal has refused to master any one language fully – which is an easy way of avoiding questions.”
Rather than allow others to ask the questions, it is Josef Koudelka’s photographs that ask the audience questions. Look again at the photographs. Do you see the tortoise in the middle of the dirt road? He is immobile. His body is upside-down. His neck is stretched, looking to the ground, and he is trying to regain support on his feet rather than balancing on the shape of his convex shell. The tortoise’s scaly legs and sharp toenails scrape uselessly into the air. He runs faster than his body allows him on the ground, but he goes nowhere. How did he get in this difficult position? And how will he get out of it? There is a trodden dirt road that disappears over a hill. It isn’t too far. Where does it lead? Where will the tortoise go, once he is back on his feet?

First came Josef’s love of Gypsy music. After college, Josef Koudelka traveled to Italy with a Slavic folk band. He knew how to dance the Klezmer. The nomadic Romani (Gypsy) people are known for wandering across North Africa, the Middle East, but especially in Eastern Europe, working as tradesmen and musicians. Over centuries the Romani have collected musical influences from the distances they have traveled: India, Arabia, Persia, Iberia, Bohemia, and Slovakia. Accordions chase guitars, trumpets parade by the pianos, and brass drums play beside the cimbalom.
Gypsy voices are unusually adenoid and rough with wide ranges and the song's notes rise and fall over the violins squealing glissando. There is a sadness and pride to Romani music that is always present, although the languages and instruments change by region. Some instruments travel from one generation onto the next. Many families play music together, during festivals, weddings, and wakes. Fathers give their sons the violins that their fathers gave unto them.
Second, Josef was attracted to the physicality of the Gypsies.
The hereditary dark skin and pronounced features of the Romani highlight their expressions of exaltation and sadness. Josef Koudelka photographed the small daily joy and heartbreak of these communities. The most beautiful and captivating photographs he took were of tradition and rituals: the dusted wrinkles on old women’s faces at funerals. He captured street concerts in photographs: the crowds gathered to listen and lines of smiling crooked teeth unknown to dentists. Josef was a magician with his camera: he froze juggler’s objects in midair, onlookers stare with eyes forever affixed towards the sky.
Josef Koudelka has never been confused for a fashion photographer like his contemporary Richard Avedon. He never stepped into a studio and only photographed his subjects and landscapes using available light. Yet, he was able to capture the timeless style of Romanian and Slavic gypsies. The men wear patched suits and women wear long homemade dresses and thick knitted sweaters covering their shoulders. There are no athletic logos or tiny alligator insignia decorating the breast pockets of shirts. The people have no need for branding, not even for their cattle, which is cared for communally.
Finally, and most completely, Josef fell in love with the gypsy lifestyle. Free from consumerism, and free to travel and live as they like, Josef adopted this life. He traveled the world taking photographs of Man, Community, Ritual, and Death. He worked for the premier international photojournalism co-op, Magnum Photos. But he took few assignments from Magnum, instead he continued to ramble by his own design. The themes of alienation, despair, and desolation resonate throughout his work, while somehow maintaining a hopefulness and sense of humor.
His scenes lack the usual bookmarks of time- there are no advertisements, no posters in the background, no logos or other recognizable cultural cues. The audience is placed in a moment that could be almost anywhere, anytime. It is this timeless quality that makes Koudelka’s photographs so memorable. Other photographers aim to capture historical moments, celebrities, assassinations, space shuttle launches, or disasters. Josef Koudelka wants to preserve scenes that could happen in any family of Man.
Koudelka formed a strong connection to his subjects. Other photographers encapsulate private moments in photographs can objectify or exploit the subject. An arrest, a funeral, a gunshot, or a kiss. Josef does not steal these moments. He preserves them storing the happy and sad in the same frame. An unobtrusive man, his photographs are like gifts given to family members. But the Gypsies, who rarely use mirrors have even less care for visages of what they looked like in yesterdays.
“Even the Gypsies were sorry for me because they thought I was poorer than them. At night they were in their caravans and I was the guy who was sleeping outside beneath the sky,” he said in an August 2008 interview.
The gypsies are abused by the government and overlooked by the masses for not making substantial economic contributions to society. The photographs of Slovakia taken in 1963 are of these families that Josef found so captivating. These families lived no regard for the popular culture. Josef also chose to live this way, with these same values. He relied on his friends, relationships, hard work, and personal curiosities rather than social norms or material objects and never felt tied down to a particular city or country.

"They can crush the flowers, but they can’t stop the Spring" - Alexander Dubcek August 21, 1968
It is the morning of his return. Josef is back to Prague after six months spent in Romania on an anthropological Gypsy assignment. In the night some 200,000 soldiers and 2,000 tanks drove through the streets of Prague beginning the lasting Soviet occupation of Czechoslovakia and violently halting Alexander Dubcek's ‘Prague Spring’ political liberalization reforms. Josef took over 5,000 photographs during the first week of occupation. His negatives were secretly messengered out of Prague by his curator friend, Anna Farova, and passed to the Magnum offices in Paris. The images were published anonymously using the name PP (Prague Photographer.) Josef feared for the lives of his family.
“'For a long time no one here was interested in remembering, but now I think they start to remember again. If this book helps the remembering I am happy. We Czechs are not like you Irish or the Poles. We do not behave bravely many times against the odds, but in this one week, as my book shows, we should be very proud of how we behave.”
After the invasion, Koudelka moved to London. He continued to sleep on the floors and couches of friends. After his three-month visa expired, he chose not to return to the Czech Republic. He became officially “stateless”, like the subject in the majority his photographs. The UK granted him asylum, where he stayed until 1979, continuing to live from a suitcase while he traveled Europe and made photographs. His images of public life are also images of the ver things that tie men together. The still of a suited man in Spain with some kind of rocket is magical. The scene seems strange to the audience. The smoke obscures the face. Why is he dressed so fashionably? Why is he releasing a missile?
In 1984, following the death of his father, Koudelka finally published his name beside his images of the Prague Invasion. He had remained anonymous for 16 years, in fear that the Czechoslovakian government would harm his family. His work began to be appreciated worldwide, including a retrospective at London’s Hayward Gallery and later the Museum of Modern Art NY, the Palais de Tokyo in Paris, the International Center of Photography in New York and the Stedelijk Museum of Modern Art in Amsterdam.
Three years later he returned to Czechoslovakia after 20 years in exile. He uses his panoramic camera to capture some of the most environmentally devastated natural land in the world, the ‘Black Triangle’, where the Germany, Poland and the Czech Republic meet. Named accordingly, The Black Triangle is one of Europe's most heavily polluted regions. The air there is thick with lignite, a soft brown coal mined locally, dust created by communist heating plants. Since the end of the Cold War, greater efforts have been made to reverse the area’s air pollution.
Today, Koudelka moves between Paris and Prague. He has two daughters and a young son, each from a different woman and each from a different country: France, England and Italy (in that order.)

The forward to Koudelka’s book Exiles was written by fellow Czech exile, Nobel Prize recipient, Czesław Miłosz. “Now hundreds of thousands, and even millions, migrate, chased from their homes by war, by harsh economic necessities, or political persecution, and an expatriate, for instance a writer, an artist, an intellectual who left his country for his own, so to say, fastidious reasons, motivated as he was not only by fear of starvation or of the police, cannot isolate his fate from the fate of those masses. Their nomadic existence, the slums they often inhabit, the deserts of dirty streets where their children play are, in a way, his own; he feels solidarity with them and he only wonders whether this is not an image, more and more generalized, of the human condition.”
Yes, Josef Koudelka is part of the masses of the global Diaspora. He moves easily, swept along with the global political, social, and economic current. But there is more to these photographs than dirty streets, poverty, and isolation. He finds simple happiness beside suffering. In the photograph of the Slovakian funeral, a large crowd gathers around the body of a woman. A white light saturates the central figure in the photograph. The mourner’s profiles are aglow, but the only faces acknowledging the camera are those of the children. Where there is grief, there is also hope.

references:
Magnum Images. Ritual. London: Andre Deutsch Limited, 1990.
Thames & Hudson, Photofile. Josef Koudelka. London: Thames & Hudson Inc. 2007.
O’Hagan, Sean. “40 years on: the exile comes home to Prague." The Observer. 24 Aug. 2008. 21 Oct 2008 .

crystal / mask

2009-03-05T15:49:00.000-08:00

Crystal in a Subaru

April 2008

Sarah Vendetta

February 2009

it is raining inside

a pipe burst

wear your galoshes

singing islands

whitney and serge

take in it

music for nothing myself

tattoo

depths

smells

poverty

the new yorker

o

JOE BRAINARD

doubt

last season

dedication

linus

oui

mugri

murray

of recent

Calm

why does pee wee herman wear lipstick?

FREE ROMAN POLANSKI

work & play

kiss the rings

l'shana tova

green weiner

fxltr

embarrassment is a fallacy

i hate you

summer reading

no notes

visitors

mountain sides

can you see the repairs in the sky?

monkeytown

RAAAAAAAANDY - Cragslist

email to my momma

summer pains

I was watching 'a room with a view'

liger beat

baby's first bike accident

ends

TERRIBLE

i plea for tenderness

henry clay

today and tomorrow

i care because you don't

sdeb

atreyu

jeans

breakdown

2/5 there

happy mothers day

Do You Want To Know Us?

MORE

adderall

the innanet

halloweeners

living stones: plants that look like pebbles

big little

heartbreaker

a poem

late announcements

brotherly love

a disposable camera

branch out

neely

all things must pass

job applications

waterloo sunsets

crazy arms

chinese sleeping

sparks on the tracks

singing islands

rough

nypd

HEY MA

the dirty pictures i draw in class

boxes

thank you