Frustration

I am going to tell the world my inner frustration with myself. It takes a lot of courage to do that, but what the hell, it's 11pm on a Sunday, I have to get up in about 9 hours and go to Washington DC and I have literally nothing to do until I fall asleep.

I am incredibly frustrated with my artwork. I hate all my older paintings, not because I think they are bad, but because I can't make those any more, I need to move onto to something new but I haven't found it yet. I don't want to do narrative, figurative or abstract works any more, but then what else is there really, or a combination of all? I hate my ideas and I don't even want to try to execute them because they already seem so stupid to me before I even have time to properly analyze them.

I want to find a way to bring literature and painting together in an unconventional way, but how? In what unconventional way? I don't just want to make illustrated books, and I don't want to make comic books and I don't want to make "word" art either. It is so frustrating to me because I just need to find a new way and I can't. I feel so incredibly useless. I feel like I am deteriorating. I just want to move on.

I guess that dude was right, I am stagnating. It is terrifying to think I will never create anything original or half as good as I want it to be. I think I might have set my own expectations for myself too high. I constantly disappoint myself, nothing is ever good enough any more. I need to figure this out before I completely burn out like a candle. Help me world.

Being vegan.. some of my thoughts

I think I need to explain a few things about me being vegan.

I don't like talking about my veganism... Because I always get the same responses, the same questions... can you imagine getting asked exactly the same questions almost every day of your life? Don't you know how boring and utterly annoying it gets? On top of asking those questions, I also always get the same responses.. and every one of those responses thinks of itself as "unique" and that I have never heard that before.

There is no way you can tell me anything about me being vegan that I haven't already heard or read. There is no point in asking me those questions because chances are I will not give you a proper compelling answer. Why? Here is why:

1. This tends to happen in situations when you just meet someone or in a large group of people. I really don’t want to talk to you for twenty minutes (or more!) about all my reasons for being vegan, detailed descriptions of everything I eat, explanations why I am completely healthy and completely satisfied.
2. You probably have a pre-conceived notion of vegans and vegan diets. There is no way I am going to change your mind about those notions by simply answering your questions. Most people are very confrontational so your questions are more to determine in your mind that you are correct in your food choices and I am just crazy. What is the point in asking me then?
3. If you’re sincerely interested and might even think about trying to do what I do, then there is a time and place for this conversation to happen. I don’t want it to happen in passing when we’re first meeting or at a party or at some social event.
4. Food is a very private thing for me. It is in some ways very sacred. I love food, different foods for different reasons. I don’t really want to talk about it, the same way I don’t really want to explain to someone my morning beauty routine or how I get ready for bed at night. Those are just normal everyday things for me that I don’t really want someone to snoop around. It’s private. Being vegan isn’t something out of the ordinary for me at all.
5. Please don’t assume that I want to preach to you my beliefs, and don’t assume I ‘follow’ veganism as a sort of cult or religion. But most people automatically assume that once I open my mouth, I am going to spew hatred toward carnivores and therefore invite me to do so by asking me about it. I am not going to explain my food choices if I hear even the tiniest negativity or disapproval in your tone of voice or your questions. I hate arguing.
6. If I try to explain my food choices, I get a lot of the same responses, all of them in various degrees of ignorance. A lot of things people believe about food are simply not true. I follow science and food news every day, unlike the majority of people. I know what is going on in the world, I know why you shouldn’t drink milk for heartburn even though it’s been the ‘approved’ method of dealing with it. I know those things because I read about them. But the person asking me about being vegan will not believe anything I tell them, simply because ‘we were taught this way in school so it must be right.” Therefore, what’s the point of me even trying to explain if my answers will never be taken seriously or respected.
7. The worst part about the questioning is the fact that I am never respected in my food choices, ever. My choice to be vegan is invaded, it is treated as something weird, abnormal, etc. Why do I have to defend my own choice in front of strangers or even friends and family? Perhaps if I was eating really unhealthy things I can understand why somebody would care. But I am not! Therefore nobody has the right to judge what I eat.

Now having said that, I do actually like talking about my veganism! But only with people that are sincerely interested in it without any negativity or disapproval, people I feel comfortable around talking about such things. Of course I love talking about being vegan, just like I love to talk about art, movies, music and other things that make up my life and my interests. I am always interested to hear what new cool berries are discovered in Brazil or what new almond milk flavor they have created. I love to talk about food and cooking because I love food and I love to cook! I love to share my cooking experiences with people and I can really only hope I can somehow influence them to make better eating choices.

Of course I am proud that I am vegan. I am proud and completely satisfied. I am in no way ashamed of it or have any problems with it. I think what people don’t understand about being vegan is that there is no “Vegan Police” that will come around the corner and arrest you if you accidentally eat a meal that had dairy or eggs in it. Sometimes those things happen, they are unpleasant and hurtful but there is nothing we can do about it. You can complain to the manager of the restaurant for having served you something you didn’t sign up for, but you will only walk away feeling angry and the restaurant will probably have an even more negative outlook on vegans. Why would you want to go around spoiling our reputation like that? It’s already hard being acknowledged and respected by the rest of the world, the more “fits” we throw, the worse it’s going to get. Look at how people hate PETA with a strong passion, and they are supposed to be the spokesmen for all the vegans out there. It’s annoying when I meet someone and they automatically think I am going to spew PETA propaganda on them.

Why am I vegan? I am not entirely sure. I keep thinking about it every day, every meal that I make for myself, every time I refuse a milk chocolate from my friends or repeat the hated phrase “I am sorry I can’t eat that.” My main reason at the beginning was the animals of course. I didn’t want to eat animals any more. It’s unethical, it is gross. I don’t want to eat something that has a face, feelings, that can feel pain, and I don’t want to ingest any of their parts either or use any of their parts. I don’t want to use products that were tested on the poor creatures. I don’t want to wear their dead skin on my feet, or drink milk from their boobs! Sorry but that is the raw truth behind going vegan for almost every vegan I know. I am not putting those phrases in here for shock value - I am simply stating it how it is. It is so upsetting to me now that children nowadays don’t know that beef comes from a live cow, that pork comes from a live pig. That children have never met a cow or a pig or a chicken. That they have no understanding of the fact that their daily glass of milk probably comes from a disgusting factory where they mistreat animals to such an extent that if someone saw it for themselves they would probably faint. I don’t understand why parents won’t tell their children such things, and I don’t understand why people themselves don’t want to find out where their food comes from.

My other reasons to be vegan are the same as everyone’s really. It’s better for my health (and anybody’s), it is better for the environment, it will help world hunger, etc etc. Just go google it and you’ll find all the information. Everybody knows that eating meat is destroying our planet in so many ways and destroying our health is so many ways. I believe that most people internally do feel guilty for eating animals but will never do anything about it.

I don’t like to preach, but I wish I could do it more. I want people to follow my example, I want people to be influenced by me and become vegetarian or vegan. But at the same time the best action is just to be there and not push it onto people. The fact that they know someone who is vegan is already enough to influence them, get them thinking about their own food choices.

Food is so important! It is the reason we’re alive. We have to treat our bodies as if they are sacred temples, only put good things in them so they won't hurt, break or develop weird diseases and cancers. And yet most people eat total shit. I am not saying I am the healthiest person ever, but I do follow certain steps to remain healthy:

1. Absolutely nothing from animals.
2. At least one piece of fruit a day. Usually I eat 3-4.
3. No white rice, white bread, etc. Only whole grains and no empty carbs that have absolutely no nutritional value except for calories. Trying not to eat bread or pasta often... instead I stick to brown rice, chickpeas and beans, lentils, peas and quinoa, and sometimes potatoes.
4. Salad at least once a day, usually with dinner, or an equivalent amount of steamed/cooked vegetables.
5. Less salt, more spice. Especially red pepper/cayenne pepper.
6. Very limited amount of processed foods, almost none at all if I can help it, unless I go out to eat.
7. Desserts are allowed in very small quantities and only purely vegan and hopefully unprocessed although I do enjoy an occasional Oreo or Luna bar.
8. Very limited amount of oil - and only olive oil. I usually cook with veggie broth or water instead of oil.

It’s very simple! My food is very uncomplicated, I don’t know why it freaks people out. If anything, I eat so much simpler compared to most meat-eaters, I don’t really understand why people think it’s complicated to be vegan. It’s so much simpler! Grocery shopping is easy because most things I buy are in the produce section. Cooking is simple because most things I make take under 30 minutes to prepare and cook. I am not scared of horrible food poisoning because most things I eat are vegetables and legumes... that I wash and prepare myself.

My typical day if I go to work looks like this:

Morning: Oatmeal or avocado+apple smoothie.

At work: Lentils/rice/peas prepared at home in a little plastic container, plus fruit.

Evening at home: Salad! Usually spinach and tomato, sometimes with cucumbers/peppers/mushrooms/whatever is in the fridge. With salad I usually make a hot dish like curried chickpeas+tomatoes; mexican rice; stir-fry; baked sweet potatoes; baked potato+lentils+salsa.

When I have people over for dinner I cook more elaborate things. My favorites to make are:

Cauliflower/potato soup

Peanut stew (chickpeas, potatoes, tomatoes, peanut butter, spices, etc)

Stuffed portobello mushrooms with avocado/tofu/tomato/etc

Vegan tacos (green peppers stir-fried with black beans)

Any variation of cooking eggplant - roasting, baking, stuffing...

I love different foods for different reasons. I love vegetables because they are crunchy, juicy, fresh, and each one has a different texture and tastes different and cooks different. I love lentils and chickpeas because they are very comforting and smooth and taste amazing. I love nuts because they are crunchy and make my jaw muscles hurt. I love fruits especially bananas and peaches and cherries because they are so sweet and summery. I love avocados because they have the perfect combination of smoothness and combine so well with tomatoes. I love baked potatoes even though I used to hate them. I love mushrooms because they are so funky and taste so good in stir-fry. I love hummus and peanut butter but try not to buy them because I tend to eat too much of them in one sitting. I love almond-milk based ice cream because it makes me feel like I am eating clouds. I could go on forever.

The point is, I love being vegan. I am proud to be vegan. I hope one day everyone will be vegan!

This is only part 1 of many posts I might make in the future about me being vegan. It's a whole universe that I can't just put into one blog post and be done.

Interpret my dreams for me

Last night’s dreams really got to me today, so I am going to try and decipher them a little bit. I am not entirely sure I believe that dreams are a way to unlock our thoughts, but I think sometimes dreams really are your brain’s “garbage” - thoughts and feelings that you need to get rid of but are finding quite hard to let go, so your brain does it for you when you’re asleep.

Here is my own crack at this Watson&Holmes type of investigation of my mind.

My first dream was actually really funny, considering all the “short” jokes my friends make about me all the time. The dream started in a grocery store. I was getting a cart and I was told I had to take a different one, which was slightly smaller and built differently, but most importantly it had a flag on it. Not like a country’s flag or anything, just a whatever looking flag. I asked why I have to have a stupid flag on my cart and I was told any person of height 5’3 and below is considered a child and therefore needs to use a child’s cart. Needless to say, I was furious! Yes I am 5’3 but I am also not a child!

After this dream ended, another one started, in which my friend Jocelyn was sorting through my laundry and trying to do my laundry for me. I told her it doesn’t need to be done because it was all clean already, but she wouldn’t listen and continued trying to separate colored clothing from the monochromatic ones.

This dream slowly turned into a dream about Alice Glass (my favorite person in the world / one half of Crystal Castles / goddess that I want to marry one day.. or be). It was as if they played a show and I was hanging out with her back stage. She was relatively friendly and even asked for my email so we can stay in touch, but she also kept getting my name wrong, instead of “Katya” she kept saying (and writing) “Katyo”. Then we all decided to go to a resort type of thing, it was my Dad, Alice Glass and a bunch of other people I don’t know in real life, and me.

This slowly turned into a dream about me trying on outfits for some sort of evening/ball at this resort which we were already at. I couldn’t decide what to wear, and when I pulled out my undergarment drawer I saw all these beautiful old-fashioned silky white bras and thought “where the hell did I get those? I haven’t had a white bra since I was 14”. And I started trying them on and realized I can’t wear them with any of my fancy evening clothes because those had either no straps or had plunging necklines or open backs, or were half see-through and so on. I was quite upset about it but then it turned into the next morning at the resort, where apparently we realized we’ve been getting a lot of stuff for free but now they caught on to us.

I walk to the room where they serve fancy breakfast and Alice and my Dad are nowhere to be seen, just me and those other people we were with. Some old lady comes up to me and gives me her pass, so I am able to go into the breakfast room as one of the VIP residents. But then I turn around and don’t see anyone I know. I am told my Dad has just developed a nasty cold and Alice Glass is still sleeping. At which point I finally wake up.

Now let’s try and break down all of the complications in this dream. The first part about my height is fairly easy... I think it was the aftermath of running into Jocelyn (in the real world) last night on the street and her telling me I look taller than usual. It may be because last weekend I was trying to prove I am not all that small... who knows.

The fact that Jocelyn was trying to do my laundry for me, which was already clean... is quite hard. It might mean that I am satisfied with some part of my life but my friends think it needs more work. Or that I find my friends being overly fussy over stuff that I don’t really care about right now. The fact that it was distinctly Jocelyn doesn’t actually mean anything. It might have been anyone and my half-awake mind put her face to this dream because it was the first person I thought of (probably because we lived together for so long).

Obviously meeting Alice Glass is just a romantic idea I’ve had since I became obsessed with Crystal Castles. On the other hand, the fact that out of all the other fans she chose to hang out with me might mean that I consider myself slightly above everyone else and my ego is just ridiculously large. The part where she kept getting my name wrong is obviously my brain telling me to stop having such a huge ego and come down to Earth, not everything circulates about Katya.

I have a theory about the white bras: I think they are part innocence, part nostalgia, part shedding the past. My whole life I only thought one thing about white bras: don’t ever buy them. See, it’s because when I was 14 and only wore white bras, my friend in Russia laughed at me and said “What are you, a kid? Nobody our age or older wears white bras.” And from that day I decided never to wear them. The fact that they appeared in my dream so vividly, the white silkiness almost blinding me, probably means that I’ve been thinking a lot about my earlier days, the white shining so brightly, signifying some sort of childish innocence that I no longer have, and the fact that I couldn’t wear the white bras in my dream shows that this innocence will never return. I think this part about never returning is further deepened by a sense of longing and nostalgia that I’ve been experiencing lately, most likely due to the expectancy of some feeling toward my trip to Bloomington this weekend. I am excited about it, but also apprehensive because I am not sure what feelings I left behind there. I left in a bit of a hurry, I had no idea what I was feeling about it. Now I feel slight nostalgic pangs when I remember certain events there, but at the same time I almost feel nothing at all. I think if I didn’t have business to go down there, I wouldn’t miss or think about missing it at all.

The rest of the dream might just be all those thoughts and dreams coming together. Realizing I had some sort of privilege that I really don’t; realizing my true lonesomeness at this point in my life and having to slightly rely on the kindness of strangers; uncertainty in my life in general, as much as uncertainty in any aspect of my life, my art, my relationships, my future, my past.

I think this dream really opened my mind a little bit about what’s going on with me emotionally lately. I’ve been trying not to think about my emotions, and at the same time I’ve been trying to look at them from a third person perspective.

coffee and novels

Work is back to being quite slow and boring.. I think I am going to continue writing my novel.

This morning our kitchen fuse blew out so I had to go to Starbucks for morning coffee and I couldn't get internet so I decided to continue working on my novel. And now I am thinking why did I ever stop working on it? It's a good way to waste some time on my computer.

And then of course I had to take pictures at work and I am terrible at taking pictures because I have never even owned a camera up until this May and guess what it's the simplest cheapest digital camera you can imagine... so I don't even know how to use this slightly more expensive equipment and thank god nobody cares otherwise I would look like a complete fool.

But back to my novel. I feel like Mort Rainey from the "Secret Window" movie, wearing glasses, writing a novel, drinking coffee.. all I am missing are Pall Malls and a cabin in the woods.

I want to retreat into a cabin in the woods. I am hoping that in a few years time I will be able to spend some time alone from civilization and sit in the woods with my cat and another human, or a few humans, and just chill for a bit. Maybe make some huge artwork that will be the size of a mansion, or a series of crazy paintings, or a really long and boring and fantastic video diary. Or maybe just meditate for months and not do anything at all, and eat only vegetables and fruits and pretend to be a monk.

There is something incredibly wonderful about the world of forgetting civilization or pretending it doesn’t exist.

Coincidences

It is very strange when you find the weirdest coincidences in life, or stumble upon things in your life that somehow together are connected to a plethora of things you are doing at the moment.

This happened to me just recently. As you might know, I have recently made some new videos, and one of them is about immortality, called "The Immortal Man" and a while back, in May I think, I made a sort of tribute to rituals, satanic worship, witchcraft and a throwback to my "goth" days, all crammed into a video called "Salt for the Devil".

A week ago I was reading about gothic literature and came upon the novel "The Monk: A Romance" by Matthew Gregory Lewis. I decided to give it a try, more for a laugh than anything else because it is old-school kitsch and a reminder to me about what I left behind in my teenage years. To my surprise, after reading about a third of the novel I found two passages, almost within just a few pages of each other, that correspond to the two videos I made recently! One passage was about an immortal man, the other was about a ritual that included throwing some substance on the ground in a circle, and placing various objects in the shape of crosses around the circle. I would like to quote both passages, and I invite you, my reader, to read the first passage, then watch my video that coincides with it, then read the second passage and watch the second video. Links are provided beneath the quotes.

M. G. Lewis on Immortality:

"Fate obliges me to be constantly in movement: I am not permitted to pass more than a fortnight in the same place. I have no Friend in the world, and from the restlessness of my destiny I never can acquire one. Fain would I lay down my miserable life, for I envy those who enjoy the quiet of the Grave: but Death eludes me, and flies from my embrace. In vain do I throw myself in the way of danger. I plunge into the Ocean; the Waves throw me back with abhorrence upon the shore: I rush into the fire; the flames recoil at my approach: I oppose myself to the fury of Banditti; their swords become blunted, and break against my breast: the hungry Tiger shudders at my approach, and the Alligator flies from a Monster more horrible than itself. God has set his seal upon me, and all his Creatures respect this fatal mark!"

My video on Immortality:

The Immortal Man

M. G. Lewis on rituals:

"He next drew from the Chest a covered Goblet: with the liquor which it contained, and which appeared to be blood, he sprinkled the floor, and then dipping in it one end of the Crucifix, he described a circle in the middle of the room. Round about this he placed various reliques, sculls, thigh-boned; I observed that he disposed of them all in the forms of Crosses. Lastly he took out a large Bible, and beckoned me to follow him into the Circle. I obeyed. 'Be cautious not to utter a syllable!' whispered the Stranger; 'Step not out of the circle, and as you love yourself, dare not to look upon my face!' "

My video which involves some sort of improvised ritual:

Salt for the Devil

Little note: I obviously know these are not exactly what my videos are about, my immortal man is very different and has his immortality on completely different terms, and the ritual performed in my video is completely different to this one.

Enzo's adventures in a new house

Sorry but today's post is going to be incredibly silly. It is specifically for Jocelyn and Enzo to enjoy!

I was cat sitting for Enzo for three nights and... I got some incredibly funny photos of him trying to be all "tough" and at the same time failing and turning into a little kitten. Here is a compilation:

I hope you enjoy this sunny kitten on a sunny Sunday! Enzo, it has been a pleasure having you and we will gladly have you again!

Exist-an-tialist

Sometimes I watch something or I read something and I suddenly get a rush of incredibly existentialist ideas. Today watching two films which ultimately talk about the same thing, made me want to disappear into the void of the universe. Because life is never as beautiful and magical as we want it to be.

I don't really want to discuss the two films so I won't say what they were. I want to discuss the fact that I am now sitting in my bed, looking at my cat grooming herself without a care in the world, except caring whether I love her or Enzo (the other cat) more or less. I wish my life sometimes was as simple as growling and hissing when I am protecting my territory and then happily curl into a ball next to my favorite person in the world. I like that the cat leaves their favorite human no choice but to love them back and love them the most, because that is how awesome cats are. Why can't I do the same thing to my favorite human in the whole world? Why can't I make my favorite human be anyone in close proximity, why can't I settle for what I deal with and not worry about intelligence, looks or grooming habits? Cats like you more if you are a social shut-in, if you spend all day at home eating lovely greasy meat and cheese foods that they can steal from you, they love it when you sweat and don't shower and the more lazy you get, the more they enjoy rolling around in the dirt of your house. It's as if the cat wants you to be a total incompetent slob. And I am not saying I want to be a slob, I am just saying I wish I could choose my humans based on reversed qualities required of people to be liked by other people.

Enough about cats. Here is the real deal. I am (once again) disappointed in humanity. I am not having dark thoughts or feeling depressed and lonely, I am just contemplating humanity and how utterly disappointing it really is, most of the time.

What do I want in life? I want kindness, elegance, beauty, care, morality, appreciation, equality, emotional visual and auditory sensations. And because those are the things I want in life, they are the things I try to provide. I try to be as caring and kind as possible, with pure selflessness thrown in. I am an artist because I want to excite people, depress them, make them wonder, make them angry or laugh, all with my artwork. I really don't do much else in life except make art, look at art (also read, listen and think) and try to make the people around me happy, satisfied, help them in every way and truthfully care about them.

What starts to depress me is when none of this is seen by anybody, when none of this is even contemplated or given back in any shape or form. I hate when everything I do ends up in someone's emotional garbage, or literally just garbage. I hate when I realize, once again, how much nobody gives a damn about anybody, how much everybody spends on themselves and how little on the rest of the world, even just thinking about it. I hate when people assume things and I hate when people put words in my mouth. I hate most of all when people simply don't care and don't even try to care.

Sometimes I go to sleep with such dark thoughts that I have incredibly dark dreams, where fictional characters materialize themselves out of my dark thoughts and end up engulfing them, eating them, making them their prey. Sometimes I make peace with the most evil persons in my dreams, sometimes I make friends with them, and it's all because in my mind the dark thoughts are colliding with everything I hate about living as a human. How many times have I contemplated living as an hermit in the caves of Nepal? Practically at least once a week this thought crosses my mind, or living completely alone on the planet. It's a weird combination of the fact that I love life and I love everything in it, including humans, but then I also despise humanity and I hate the life that humanity leads, leaving me to imagine a world without them.

I am just upset I guess that life really is bitter, sour, morbid, full of fear and hate and apathy most of the time. I wish it wasn't, I wish there was something that interested every single person in the world and I wish people got rid of their inner demons and learned to appreciate one another. I wish everyone thought about beauty and elegance instead of ugly thoughts of hate and disgust. I wish everyone walked around with huge smiles on their faces and greeted each other and felt no grudges or judgemental feelings. I wish we all groomed ourselves properly and cared about what we put out into the world, and at the same time wished to be closer to stars and other galaxies and not afraid to think outside of our Planet Earth. I wish people were not scared of the universe and the fact that we are incredibly small and pathetic and unneeded. A lot of human problems would be solved once everyone realized we are not special or unique and therefore all the big-headedness would disappear and hopefully some harmony could return to the world.

MCA Chicago

I went to the Museum of Contemporary Art finally! (in Chicago... obviously cause that's where I live)

Overall... not actually too bad! I really liked some of the exhibits and they have some iconic paintings that I really enjoyed looking at. Also: I felt incredibly smart when I was approached by two elderly ladies who asked me if I can tell them a little bit about Chuck Close. I was like... YES my time to shine. Because as much as I struggled all throughout art history in college, all that information really stuck to my brain, and now I can show off my slightly useless knowledge! Anyway... bragging aside, here is what I liked/found interesting:

"First 50": this is an exhibition of the first 50 artworks that came into MCA's collection. It had quite a range, from Ed Paschke to Chuck Close to Enrico Baj and so on. I have a soft spot for Ed Paschke, I am not going to lie. I share his interest in collecting images from all printed visual media, and I am really fascinated by how he transformed television type of visual imagery into painting... it translates so well. I remember the first time I came across one of his works, I had no idea who he was or what he was about, but immediately thought: wow this artist works from television imagery... and I was so right. His colors are bright and slightly off-putting by being so "commercial" and "likeable" at first glance. But then the more you look at the colors, the more you realize how sickly disgusting they are and how well they fit the overall theme. I do love Ed Paschke.. so please don't judge me on that. I know in some art circles he is listed with the likes of Jeff Koons but in my mind they are millions of miles apart.

Apart from Ed Paschke, I also really liked Enrico Baj, who I don't think I've ever seen before in real life, and Gladys Nilsson.

"Phantom Limb: Approaches to Painting Today": the title is pretty self-explanatory, but I would just like to mention that they are exploring why painting is always believed to be a dying artform, and it always comes back to bite you in the ass... because painting will never die out, and this exhibition is looking at ways that painting is evolving, which is part of the reason why it will never die. Of course, this is my cup of tea.. because painting is my life. I don't just like to paint.. I have to look at it, examine it, I love going to a museum and looking at the thickness on paintings, how they were painted, look for imperfections, brushwork... and so on. Anyway, my latest obsession is finding out little known AbEx painters, partly because that's what I do in my internship, and partly because I have a new found love for abstract painting.

First of all.. they had a Rauschenberg! This one to be precise: "Retroactive II" from 1963:

I really enjoyed Sergej Jensen, he uses a variety of different materials to paint on, which creates interesting new textures. His palette is very subdued but it has a calming and reassuring effect. Here is one of his works I found on another gallery's website, "Untitled" from 2010:

Isn't it just beautiful? Finally, this is not something I like but this struck me like lightning.. in the middle of the room I found a Josh Smith and it reminded me of my Intro to Art class in college... when we had to incorporate the word "CAT" into an artwork and the image of a cat, but make it inconspicuous. I think that idea comes from Josh Smith's work including his initials.

"Rashid Johnson: Message to Our Folks": This is very "conceptually loaded". He uses a lot of shared experiences and references by constructing artwork from his everyday objects. He is exploring the past and the culture he comes from, but to me it's just something a lot of artists do... and I am not so sold on this idea. For me art is escapist, it is imaginary, it is not your therapist that tells you to dig deeper into your roots to find the core of your problems. I don't really enjoy when art is based on the everyday, when art is given a very direct concept with little room for interpretation. Having said that, I did enjoy some of the works by Johnson, especially all the broken mirror works and the combination of black and gold is very visually appealing. So my question is.. should an artist have a face, a name, an ethnicity, a context background? Should an exhibit have an explanation? I think I would have enjoyed this a lot more if I didn't read what this exhibition was about before or even after seeing it.

Molly Zuckerman-Hartung: Quite interesting abstract art. I didn't like the works where she had the canvas (?) hanging in strips between paintings, but I liked some works such as "Victorian Sex Painting":

New York School: Always a classic of course, focusing on late 40s and 50s, with some amazing works by Rothko, deKooning, Kline, etc. Since I changed my mind about Rothko, this is the first time I've seen it up close and personal. Before, Rothko was one of my least favorite artists from that era but now that I really like his work, I was blown away by the work presented here, which is "Untitled" from 1969 that hasn't been on display since 1996! What! I know, why would they hide a gem like this one. Sorry for the seriously bad quality photo here, I couldn't find a better one online:

I was really not impressed with Esteban Vicente.. honestly he slightly reminded me of Cezanne.. I don't like Cezanne. Philip Guston on the other hand really interested me, because I have not seen a lot of his works in real life, and they really are quite beautiful and playful. I have to say I was disappointed in deKooning because I used to really enjoy his works, but now I getting sick of his "I am an abstract painter but I am gonna stick a figure in here anyway" approach. And as much as I am not a fan of Barnett Newman, the painting they had on display called "Galaxy" made me stare at it for quite a few minutes. When you imagine that the strip of brown is our lifetime in the vastness of the red unknown cosmos, it makes your head swirl a little bit. This is why abstract painting is so incredibly complex and can really take your breath away... you can pretend it's anything in the world, it is imaginative and structurally diverse.

"Skyscraper: Art and Architecture Against Gravity": I don't have much to say... I am not into buildings that much, and I know that the Skyscraper is iconic but to me it's just another one of those concept-ridden art things that best left to interpretation than solid themes. I did enjoy seeing Westermann's "Memorial to the Idea of Man if He was an Idea" because I remember studying it in art history and laughing... And I actually kind of enjoyed Roger Brown's comic-book lookalike story-telling fresh solid paintings, although not in a serious kind of way. This is "Ablaze and Ajar" from 1972:

I also kind of liked Marie Bovo's two photographs, "Cour Interieure 29 Avril 2009" and "Cour Interieure 19 novembre 2009" because they were simply aesthetically beautiful.

Books from London

I finally took the time to scan all the books I made when I spent a semester in London.

The project was that there are real people and there are fictional people. And then there are those in between... taken from reality but added a little more flavor to. I decided to create completely fictional characters, with completely fictional lives and most importantly, deaths. Every story would start with the notion that this character is already dead. And each story would be told as a biographical account, dry and lacking in metaphors, therefore making it seem like a very true story, rather than fiction.

I created four books. Each book focuses on one fictional character and his "entourage". Each story is more and more bizarre, as the first story I wrote, Russell Brown, is very close to real life and could have happened anywhere. The last one, "Squirrel Guardian" is rather strange.

Here are scans of all 4 books, in order of strangeness (according to me.. not anyone else) and I apologize, scanning them was really hard because they were made on really fragile hand-made Indian paper but I tried my best to preserve the essence of not only the drawings and the words, but also the tactile factor of the books. After all, I made them completely by hand without any outside help!
Click on each image to see it in full size to be able to read it!

Russell Brown:

Without a Twin

London Eye

Squirrel Guardian

Illustrations

Last summer I worked for Bela-Fond charity and created illustrations for the their fairy-tale project. This one was for a tale called "The Moth and the Nightingale."

Here are some of my favorite ones that I made: