the OBSERVING phase

next on my list...

2012-01-24T12:46:00.001-08:00

Phaidon's recently released Vitamin P2: New Perspectives in Painting. Thank you Amazon.com for this heads up!

free museum day.

2012-01-17T12:37:00.000-08:00

Every Tuesday different museums are free in the park nearby. I arrived too early and forgot to bring my residents ID so I had to pay full price. Excellent way to start the day. But it was rewarding. The best things in life are not always free...although it helps.

what holds the bird up.

2012-01-07T20:05:00.000-08:00

"The function of the overwhelming majority of your work is simply to teach you how to make the small fraction of your work that soars."

studio update.

2011-12-12T20:04:00.000-08:00

root hope.

2011-08-25T16:37:00.000-07:00

R and I have been giving water to these two for the past two week. We found them sun bathing on the sidewalk after having been trimmed from some neighbor'd garden. Today, I thought that they were adopting a funky smell and was preparing to chuck them when I noticed something white and fuzzy....mold!?!

NO. ROOTS. R says that we are being taught a lesson in patience. And so to the rest of you out there, searching for something and not finding any other result than a funky odor...hang in there. Something is growing below.

2011-05-28T07:52:00.001-07:00

Giovanni Battista Piranesi, 1760's

changes.

2011-05-24T10:11:00.000-07:00

I am moving back to California after three years of being in Madrid. Did I ever tell you that I have been teaching English conversation here? My students graduated two weeks ago in a "banding" ceremony, very different from an American high school graduation. Here are a few of the nearly 200 seniors I had the priviledge of working with this past year.

So yes, I am moving back to San Diego, CA where my immediate family has resided since I was a 10 year old. Riccardo follows me shortly thereafter and then we will be married, July 24th. I've been trying to be present here, walking around, memorizing streets and faces but the truth of the matter is that I can't remember everything and things do change. And change is a good thing in this case, it signifies growth and forward movement. We've little idea what these next few years hold for us other than learning how to be a married couple for, you see, we've no jobs, no apartment and little idea as to where to begin but we'll figure it out.

But more than trying to freeze memories in my mind so as to never forget, I've been trying to digest all that has occurred these past three years. I have gone from being a single, scared, aupair with few belongings to being an engaged, somewhat fearless, but still wary, teacher with more things than can fit in the one suitcase that internatioal airlines allow you without paying extra. The things that I know are that I love the man I will be marrying, I am excited to be near to my family for some time, that I need to continue my own education and professional growth and that changes are brewing on the horizon.

went on a walk today...

2011-05-16T11:49:00.000-07:00

Hymn Of Promise-1986 (I think)

2011-05-08T06:22:00.001-07:00

Hymn Of Promise Hymn

In the bulb there is a flower; in the seed, an apple tree;
In cocoons, a hidden promise: butterflies will soon be free!
In the cold and snow of winter there’s a spring that waits to be,
Unrevealed until its season, something God alone can see.

There’s a song in every silence, seeking word and melody;
There’s a dawn in every darkness, bringing hope to you and me.
From the past will come the future; what it holds, a mystery,
Unrevealed until its season, something God alone can see.

In our end is our beginning; in our time, infinity;
In our doubt there is believing; in our life, eternity,
In our death, a resurrection; at the last, a victory,
Unrevealed until its season, something God alone can see.

holy week.

2011-04-12T22:52:00.000-07:00

Today is the last full day of class and work before we go on vacation and head into Holy Week, the end of Lent and the initiation of the process of rejection, rebirth and resurrection. Flowers have been blooming in every place and this spring I have made myself get into the habit of watching the trees daily, tracking their growth and watching them sprout new life quite literally overnight. Green has this manner of simply appearing and reminding me of the poem we took out of Jon's memory banks and plastered on the walls of the Vermillion Sea Station down in Baja.

I have wound myself into a mess with a close and dear friend of mine this week and I find myself glad that this trip was planned some time ago, I need fresh air and to not be stuck in my room wondering what's going to happen and how we got here. Tomorrow I will hoof my pack to school with me and meet R afterwards to head to Rome. Rome. The home of so many people, pieces and things that make my head spin. We then head to Basel, Switzerland and Lake Konstanz in Southern Germany to visit friends, make amends and celebrate Easter. The green rebirthing of spring and life.

Have a great weekend.

working...

2011-04-08T08:10:00.000-07:00

I have been working on this drawn collage of three cities: Rome, Madrid and San Diego. A collision of spaces.

studio wall-abril.

2011-04-07T08:04:00.000-07:00

Reading: a lot about Goya and Carlos III-got to love that nose!

R and I are getting ready to make the move to California in June/July and that happens to be all consuming.

saturday excursion

2011-04-07T07:55:00.000-07:00

This past Saturday R and I went to Buitrago de Lozoya -a small town with deep arab, jewish and Christian roots that has a remarkably well taken care of city wall. We brough a picnic which we ate along the banks of the Lozoya river, Buitrago is surrounded on three sides by water, and then proceeded to simply wander. After nearly 2 hours on the bus from Madrid (less than 5 euros each way) it was necessary to stretch our legs and then to draw a bit.

from: elpais.com

2011-03-15T00:34:00.000-07:00

"Además, el temblor ha tenido consecuencias planetarias: el eje de la tierra se ha desplazado 6,5 pulgadas (16,7 centímetros) y aceleró el movimiento de rotación, acortando la duración del día en 1,8 millonésimas de segundo. No es algo inédito: el terremoto de Chile del año pasado, de una magnitud de 8,8, movió el eje unos 7,6 centímetros y acortó el día 1,26 millonésimas de segundo. Y el terremoto de Sumatra en 2004 lo hizo en 6,8 millonésimas de segundo."

...the earthquake has had consequences for the planet: the earth's axis was displaced by 6.5 inches (16.7 centimeters) and increased the movement of rotation, cutting the duration of a day by 1.8 milliseconds of a second. It is not something without precedent: the earthquake in Chile from last year, with a magnitude of 8.8, moved the earth's axis by some 7.6 centimenters and cut the length of a day down by 1.26 milliseconds. The earthquake in Sumatra in 2044 did the same by 6.8 milliseconds.

WOW.

keeping in shape.

2011-03-08T12:07:00.000-08:00

5 and 15 minute studies.

2011-02-28T12:25:00.000-08:00

I am standing in front of a green door above which a sign hangs that reads "Reception of Emergencies." The two women behind the main desk don't know what to tell me other than to say that I knock on the green door. I knock and inside they tell me to wait. On the other side of this avacado colored door they filter through people in order to determine what really is an "emergency" and what is not. Those that receive a negative answer from the painted door of this poorly situated room wait in another room, also dirty but due more to its overuse than to a lack of cleaning. There we will wait together for the voice that willo some unknown destination and the women that receive paychecks for working here don't know what to tell me.

luz.

2011-02-14T10:13:00.000-08:00

Check out the light that was shining on my tamal on Saturday morning! Early birthday celebration.

this morning...

2011-02-10T06:53:00.001-08:00

This morning on the metro the man next to me was writing "If you asked me why I was here, I honestly wouldn't know how to respond." He proceeded to make a list of "It could be because"'s and I continued reading "Quarterlife Crisis", a book which we were supposed to have read back in college but did little more than simple purchase. Today I read:

"I think it's crucial to physically write down personal goals and priorities on a regular basis. Maybe it's every six months, maybe it's every five years, but goals change and situations change, so you have to do it continually. And the biggest part of the exercise is not to come up with the list, but to understand why each goal is on the list and why this priority is higher than that one." Said by Doug, a 1996 grad of the University of Iowa.

Sometimes I find it easier to name the things that are NOT goals, are NOT important, than the things that really are. But some of the important things are:

having a pair of shoes
knowing that I am doing the best that I know how to do
knowing a few answers and asking a lot of questions
being creative and creatively stimulated
not littering
loving and being loved by my family
keeping in touch with dear friends
taking time to pause and reflect.

in the first place...

2011-01-30T10:39:00.001-08:00

I came to Madrid just to see it, in the first place. And then I became interested in things like language, chestnut trees, a boy who is now my fiance and what it felt like to be me but here. An hour ago I came across this photo and the past two and a half years all came flooding back like an overflowing tank full of memories. I've been thinking about writing a book.

roof views.

2011-01-16T00:07:00.000-08:00

Don't have much to say, just that my small rooftop sometimes forces me to take the deepest, soul-touching breaths.

to you and yours.

2011-01-03T12:14:00.000-08:00

Happy Holidays from Southern California!

hunger.

2010-11-23T06:51:00.001-08:00

Just saw another young couple picked old fruit out of the grocery dumpster. Where is this all going?...

studio.

2010-11-16T09:34:00.000-08:00

Winter is settling in and here are a few shots around my little corner studio. I am stuck somewhere between wierd little shapes and Ciculo de Bellas Artes female-nude tradition.

Been thinking about: Not thinking so much. Francisco Goya. Church and cathedral interiors. Arches. Brahms.

"Amor, rosa encendida, "Love, rose aflame
bien tardaste en abrirte! well were you late in opening!
La lucha te sano The fight saved you
y ya eres invencible. and you are now invincible."

-Jimenez "Sol en el camarote"

goya.

2010-10-29T11:25:00.000-07:00

Portrait of Francisco Goya, Vicente López y Portaña (1772–1850)

"To live to the age of eighty-two, as Goya did, was a great stroke of biological luck. To do so while staying sane and working right up till the end-for there is no evidence of senile decay or dementia in Goya's last years, although physical infirmities did, of course, take their toll-was well-nigh miraculous. He was a tough, tenacious old bird" R. Hughes, Goya.

Go get'em Goya.

2010-09-13T10:54:00.000-07:00

Walking down Bravo Murillo to where it becomes Fuencarral and suddenly I am the typani in Respighi's Pines of Rome. Madrid shoots up around us, growing and pushing upward, and my eyes glow from the effort.

finished work.

2010-09-11T09:44:00.000-07:00

A few weeks back I posted some pen and pencil drawings of hydrangeas that were scanned and sent to dear friend and graphic artist Sydney VanOrden to use in a wedding invitation package. Here is her final product!

Thanks Sydney!

anew.

2010-09-07T11:32:00.001-07:00

Started a new drawing studio today. Funny. Three hour pose, female model, lots of old men and me. Tight drawing, small sheet of paper or sketch books and I felt like I was back in the 1920's. I lasted for two hours and ended up with three unfinished drawings and the voices of my professors rattling in my brain, "Concentrate. Look for the forms, they are only forms. Measure. Don't stop looking."

I walked home. Tomorrow's goal: do the same thing.

e.e. cummings

2010-08-31T08:00:00.000-07:00

i thank You God for most this amazing
day: for the leaping greenly spirits of trees
and a blue true dream of sky; and for everything
which is natural which is infinite which is yes

(i who have died am alive again today,
and this is the sun's birthday; this is the birth
day of life and of love and wings: and of the gay
great happening illimitably earth)

how should tasting touching hearing seeing
breathing any-lifted from the no
of all nothing-human merely being
doubt unimaginable You?

(now the ears of my ears are awake and
now the eyes of my eyes are opened.)

softball and Nouwen.

2010-08-18T22:28:00.001-07:00

I recently started Henri Nouwen's "The Return of the Prodigal Son" and was reading this past Tuesday afternoon while waiting for my sister to complete her first soccer practice of the season. The parking spot which I had happened to choose was located in front of the baseball field and behind the plate. A young girl began warming up, throwing the yellow softball over-hand to her older partner, moving back and back as she threw. She stood sideways, her feet placed far apart from one another, and I was beginning to wonder if softball pitchers always stood that way when she suddenly flew into action. Leaping in the air, her arm spun around once, her right foot kicking forward while the left came down behind to act as a break. In a flurry of motion and a cloud of dust it began and end and the ball landed with a thud in her partner's glove.

"I really did not have an inkling of how difficult the journey would be. I did not realize how deeply rooted my resistance was and how agonizing it would be to 'come to my senses,' fall on my knees, and let my tears flow freely.
Each little step toward the center seemed like an impossible demand, a demand requiring me to let go one more time from wanting to be in control, to give up one more time the desire to predict life, to die one more time to the fear of not knowing where it all will lead, and to surrender one more time to a love that knows no limits. And still, I knew that I would never be able to live the great commandmente to love without allowing mylse fot be loved without conditions or prerequisites. The journey from teaching about love to allowing myself to be loved proved much longer than I realized." H. Nouwen

biolans.

2010-08-11T09:05:00.000-07:00

I was recently instructed to highlight the words and phrases that most resonated with me from my Gallup's Strengths Quest results. "…in your should you know that we are all connected…you gain confidence from knowing that we are not isolated from one another…It sustains you and your close friends in the face of life's mysteries." And that is all rather wordy but the basic note rings with a lot of truth. No one is ever forgotten and there is a lot of peace generated in that "We're all in this together!" High School Musical mentality. So I rented a car. This past Saturday I drove back up Interstate-5 to the land of my alma-mater to rustle up whoever might be around and this is who I found.

Eric MacLeod.
Eric graduated from Biola in 2008 and at the time was nursing a budding passion for the written word. Well, the form of the written word. Type. After graduation he stayed on as a graphic design intern and realized that he couldn't find exactly the typefaces that he was longing for and thus turned to creating his own. Currently he works on the outskirts of Los Angeles for a digital photo frame manufacturer.
Eric was kind enough to allow me to invade his home, which he shares with a number of other college graduates, and his small corner workspace/studio. I am impressed by the level at which type hits Eric…he bends over the New York Times and circles the small angles, blobs and bulges that he finds so communicative about the written form that words take.

Laurel Wilson.

Laurel, also Biola 2008, is perhaps one of the most thoughtful art makers that I have ever met. She embeds deep threads of conscious thought into her work which straddles the genres of installation, sculpture and, in my opinion, drawing. There is a curiosity in her that keeps it's head close to the ground, hunting for new material and it's meaning. After having completed a number of internships, including working on the set of the film Inception, she will be looking at graduate programs in the Southern California area come this fall.

Jamie Uretsky.
Jamie, currently working on her Masters at the University of Connecticut, is another self-aware, curious and excited art maker who also happens to be a dear friend of mine. After graduating from Biola in 2007 she spent one year in Southern California, one year in Monterey, CA and then moved to Stores, Connecticut. Her nearly obsessive need to make work is really an overwhelming call to participate in that which surrounds and forms her. It is, perhaps, a way of processing and a way of taking in information, touching it and watching it change and redefine itself. She will be finishing up at UConn this next spring and will be showing in the NY area come summer 2010.

Sydney Van Orden.
Sydney finished up at Biola in December 2007 and took off on a trip through Western Europe. Since then she has moved around San Diego and has cashed in her paints for degrees in copy editing and graphic design. A current student at UC San Diego, she is finishing up at digital arts degree and is working as a free lance designer and photographer. In my opinion the step between her abstract painting and current work is small as the work is consistently concerned with color, shape and space. Upon graduation this coming year she will be taking a job and leaving San Diego for bigger waters.

Hope Bartel.

Hope Bartel and I worked in the same studio our last year at Biola and we graduated together in 2008. Hope loves to concentrate on the minuscule. She works as a free lance editor, helping others manage the ever present evils of grammar and punctuation in their dissertations and publications, and she finds delight in small drawings, slight movements of the pencil and of light. She and her husband live in Whittier, CA and will be moving to St. Andrews, Scotland in the spring of 2011 where her husband will be completing a Masters in some sort of crazy uniting of theologic terms and poetry.

Dan Callis.
Dan Callis is my professor, mentor and an ever-influential artist in terms of work ethic and commitment to constant study. He is the head of the Biola abstract painting department and though I could write long paragraphs about the work that he has done and exhibited, I would rather speak on the small studio visit that occurred on this trip. Graciously opening his studio to a few old students, Dan took down some work and began to explain how the pieces connected, where his brain and visual field were going to and coming from. And that process amazes me. It is rare to find someone consistently interested in pushing themselves towards what might be around the next bend. And in there, somewhere locked into a brushstroke that surges forth to counteract another, is where he discovers and locates faith and hope and joy and grace. There is a love of color that reverberates, conversing between the different families of work and it is always a joy to share in that.

hydrangeas for Sydney

2010-08-03T20:45:00.000-07:00

Three pen on yellowed tracing paper over pencil drawings. Sydney VanOrden will be taking these and using them in some of her graphics work...aren't collaborations exciting? Will post her final work soon.

it's getting hard to be someone, but it all works out.

2010-07-13T20:04:00.000-07:00

I both drew and painted today. Ouch. Just thought I should share.

college grads and the learning process.

2010-07-08T11:06:00.000-07:00

I have been condensing the 8 boxes that I left at my parent’s home into 2 or 3. It has been slow going, as digging through memories often is, and I sat down with two journals from a trip through Baja, Mexico, CA I took my freshmen and junior year at Biola University. What I have discovered in myself these past two years after graduation is a passion for the process of learning and in that first journal, that first trip, I think I have located when I began to recognize of that development. Allow me to share a bit:

Page 1; 1-2-05: “When you wake up in the morning, you need to begin observing.” This is what I hope to gain from this adventure and this trip. I want to learn to observe. To take mental note of things, faces, places I go without really knowing it, I want it to become a natural occurance…my expectations are namely on myself. I need to learn to think as an artist.

Page 10; 1-5-05: I had slept in a cot on a patio above the shore of a huge bay ringed by the Baja peninsula and various islands. There was a large mountain range in front of me behind which the sun was rising. The clouds were all hues of red, pink, purple and light gray and the sun was not up yet. I feel I am at an awkward stage. I don’t see things as my teachers do, in colors, shapes, lights and darks, textures, etc. And no poetry springs to mind. All I feel through my senses is music when I see such things. I hear singing. I wish I saw as an artist. I am awed by the colors, I’ve never seen such color.

Page 21; 1-7-05: I was given a first chance to paint, and I simply blew it. I was unable to see the colors, nothing was looking correct…I am frustrated.
I sat down again, a different place this time, and decided to begin again. Though I did not get much accomplished due to lack of time, I actually had fun with it…It’s needed that I get out on my own and experiment, to get things wrong, but to practice all the while. J said that the point of this class, and of painting in general, is not simply to make attractive paintings but to reveal whatever it was that attracted us to paint; then we are learning to look. And looking and seeing are our goals.

Page 26; 1-9-05: I feel that my eyes are now just beginning to open, and like in Annie Dillard’s writing, I am learning to see for the first time. Granted, I still cannot see very well, but things and color and light are slowly revealing themselves to me. The process is almost painful and I have to force myself to think. My thoughts need to escape but I do not know how to put them into words.

Page 67; 1-21-05: How is it that I’ve been here but haven’t really been here? Does any of it make sense? Is it supposed to make sense? Me and my childlike mind. I long to know so much more. How do I ask? What exactly are the right and wrong questions? So I breathe deeply. Sometimes I just want to scream, am I still allowed to cry? Is there an age limit to voicing and showing frustrations? There must be. There is human weakness, emotion. And at the same time that is what makes us so good, so able.

Page 68; 1-21-05: Am I frustrated with myself? My mind, my hands…so many thoughts. Too many, where do I put them all? There’s enough room in this violet/pale blue sky I’m staring into. Perhaps I’ll throw them there.

Page 69; 1-22-05: I have been worrying far too much without even realizing it. The joy of being an art major and an artist comes from the fact that I will always be learning, I will never fully know everything. Both my professors and this trip made me say this: My mind and my hands are connected, they are one. I am going to do this, to stretch out my abilities, whatever they may be, and to widen my mind. I have a hard time including others in my art, allowing them to see, to help, but I am proud of myself when I learn something new or make something work for me that hasn’t before.

LEARNING IS DIFFICULT. It is never easy to admit that we do not know something that we dearly wish we did and to start from scratch. We produce a large number of bad results and the process is never short and sweet. But I think that the desire to learn, to try, is essential and then the courage to stick it out must be fostered, encouraged and grown both by our selves and by our teachers. So, keep chin up and get to work.

the creative spirit.

2010-06-29T18:59:00.001-07:00

We were made to read Twyla Tharp's "The Creative Habit" as graduating seniors from a BFA program in attempt, I believe, to give us a head start in what would later be the hardest struggle of all: maintaining creativity. And that it is a fight, a disciple, a habit instead of merely a hobby or a gift, is absolutely true.

I am approaching the two year marker, two years since having finished Tharp's book and my undergraduate education, and Creativity and I are looking one another in the face. If you have seen the film Avatar, I would like you to have in mind that moment when Jake Sully must "choose" and "be chosen by" the beast which will later be his flying transport. It is a battle, a constant choosing and the question of whether to maintain or to jump ship must be answered eventually.

So I am beginning another such book: "The Artist's Way" by Julia Cameron. (Julie, I apologize ahead of time for all of the adjustments I will make to your program and all of the critiques I will make along the way which is simply my way of doing things.) And already I have been punched in the gut several times. Speaking about being aware of and acknowledging the movements that we make in our creative lives as if they were notes, instruments:"We are hearing ourselves as we sing our song. We are able, then, to be instrumental in our own change."

And because I don't know how to post without pictures...here is a pomegranate don't-hit-the-sidewalk-post.

happy ceramics.

2010-06-21T07:48:00.000-07:00

One of the last family owned and run Spanish ceramic studios stands in my neighborhood on Fernando Villaverde. It's hours are strange and the small store front is jam packed with pieces produced in the attached studio. Certain areas of Spain are known for the colors used in their ceramics and these are best classified as the indicative colors of the Castilla region.

M came to Spain.

2010-06-19T14:52:00.000-07:00

cummings 82

2010-06-08T01:35:00.001-07:00

true lovers in each happening of their hearts
live longer than all which and every who;
despite what fear denies, what hope asserts,
what falsest both disprove by proving true

(all doubts, all certainties, as villains strive
and heroes through the mere mind's poor pretend
-grim comics of duration: only love
immortally occurs behind the mind)

such a love is love's any now
and her each here is such an everywhere
even more true would truest lovers grow
if out of midnight dropped more suns than are

(yes; and if time should ask into his was
all shall, their eyes would never miss a yes)

-Remindings: If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames,but have not love, I gain nothing.

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

Love never fails.... but when perfection comes, the imperfect disappears... Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.

And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.

thoughts being thought.

2010-05-26T07:05:00.000-07:00

So, in Sevilla...

during the Feria which was full of flamenco dressers and horsies...

I ran into this:

San Diego, I will return to San Diego for the summer in less than one month.

Madrid is hot right now and I am glad to be missing out on the hot hot heat of July and August.

Another smoker threw his empty pack to the ground as I walked by on my way home. What the heck is that?

Everyone else is going either home or getting married and I will be staying another year.

My life feels more solid than before.

I like teaching and I miss Nesbit.

This summer will involve drawing.

construct.

2010-04-08T00:58:00.000-07:00

I spent the past week and a half traveling by train from Amsterdam to Ghent to Brussels to Paris to Montpellier and back again. The results are a head-cold and lots of thoughts, both written and non-recorded. The theme of the trip seemed to be construction, everything was undergoing revamping and reviving and redoing. It's that time of year I suppose...

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

6.

7.

8.

9.

10.

11.

12.

"I cannot say that I now understand Hals or Van Gogh better than I did before but perhaps know how better to listen. Traveling in this manner has a lot to do with shutting one's mouth and opening the eyes, the mind, the heart. There is such generosity if only we know how to receive it. Such things are often spoken softly and must be looked for and sought after. A poor soul is the soul content with what it has already been given. Nothing that is given is easily kept and I fear that without a fight, we will never grow."

a good book.

2010-04-07T02:51:00.000-07:00

And a simple, redemptive read. Because my words are sometimes better spoken by others, here is a review written by the author of from: Regular Rumination, books and more books:

"Enzo is a dog. Enzo is also the narrator of The Art of Racing in the Rain by Garth Stein. At the end of his life, Enzo decides to contemplate his life from his beginnings as a puppy when his master Denny adopts him to the rest of his time with Denny and the family Denny loves. Enzo is a careful observer, intent on coming back in the next life as a human, he often thinks and acts like a person rather than a dog; however, we never lose sight of the fact that Enzo has a slightly different perspective of the world.

This is a simple but beautiful novel that depicts an unfortunate and upsetting situation through the eyes of an unlikely narrator. There are so many things about this novel that should not work. First, we know just about everything that’s going to happen before it happens. There is little suspense or surprise in this novel, and though I would say most of it is intentional, I also think that way too much was revealed on the front jacket flap. Second, it is narrated by a dog. Third, much of the novel is told through car racing metaphors. For someone who has little interest in car racing or the metaphors that go with it, Enzo and Stein made me care absolutely about Denny and his races, and also gave me a much greater appreciation for the sport of car racing.
Enzo sometimes doesn’t sound very dog-like, but that’s because he’s been so well educated after watching TV all day. And he desperately wants to become a man, so it’s all okay. This novel is heartbreaking in so many ways, but it is also hopeful. I found myself in tears more than once; especially at the end, when I needed several tissues. I think Stein has pulled off something really impressive here and I highly recommend it."

all i want is to be honest.

2010-03-23T15:51:00.000-07:00

I am listening to a song that was gifted to a friend of mine and then re-gifted to me right before college graduation. Stations, by Denison Witmer, " Stations make me think of my own travels, all the people and places I've been through, when you find out they're the same things as the people and the places where you grew.

My backpack looked to be finished when it realized that I had not given it any underwear to eat...silly, hungry backpack. Tomorrow it will load itself upon my back and we will head off for 11 days through Amsterdam, Ghent, Brussels, Paris, Montpellier and all of the train rides that lie in between. This traveling alone is strange business and I have that odd feeling again, that feeling that I am doing something that I should and that I want to but more for the fact that it is good for me than because I need it. Or perhaps it is the other way around. I closed my eyes on the Metro and just holed up for a few minutes, that helped.

Will report back, wiser and wearier, having made new friends and met up with old ones, better for having wept in front of so many works of art and stronger for having walked and biked to see them.

I love.

anew.

2010-03-19T12:41:00.000-07:00

It is the first day of spring, according to some calendar I saw somewhere, and things are opening. Everywhere. Conversations, hearts, rain clouds, and the chestnut leaves begin their cycle again and remind me that once more a set of decisions must be made soon. I have seen them turn from green leaves to naked branches, from nude branch to full flower, from full foliage to full leaf and from solid green back into the closed brown of winter.

I have just begun to listen to Jars of Clay again, hearkening back to high school nights spent in my cold, basement work space, and "I've got a question....Where are you?" As we head further into the guts of Lent and hurtle towards Easter with a speed I do not recognize, I feel that question deeply. Oh Christ, that You would once more be made flesh if only to stand here alongside me and my other opening questions.

...mas se fue desnudando
y yo le sonreía

se quedo con la túnica
de su inocencia antigua.
Creí de nuevo en ella.

(...she undressed herself further
and I smiled

she remained with the tunic
of her old innocence.
I believed in her anew.)

j.r. jimenez

42 e.e. cummings.

2010-03-18T04:00:00.000-07:00

here's to opening and upward, to leaf and to sap
and to your (in my arms flowering so new)
self whose eyes smell of the sound of rain

and here's to silent certainly mountains; and to
a disappearing poet of always, snow
and to morning; and to morning's beautiful friend
twilight (and a first dream called ocean) and

let must or if be damned with whomever's afraid
down with ought with because with every brain
which thinks it things, nor dares to feel (but up
with joy; and up with laughing and drunkenness)

here's to one undiscoverable guess
of whose mad skill each world of blood is made
(whose fatal songs are moving in the moon

vincent continues...

2010-03-15T16:03:00.000-07:00

Life has become very dear to me, and I am very glad that I love. My life and my love are one. “But you are faced with a `never, no, never,' ” is your reply.

My answer to that is, “Old boy, for the present I look upon that `never, no, never' as a block of ice which I press to my heart to thaw.”

To determine which will win, the coldness of that block of ice or the warmth of my heart, that is the delicate question about which I can give no information as yet.

As for me, I press the block of ice “never, no, never” to my heart; I have no other choice, and if I try to make it thaw and disappear - who can object to that???...Let those be melancholy who will. I have had enough of it, and will only be glad as a lark in spring! I will sing no other song but aimer encore!

march 13, 2010.

2010-03-14T11:03:00.000-07:00

Afternoon comes with the realization and reminder that "those who are with us are more than those against us." I chose the road that less I travel by and a small, old woman turned around to look at me and ask if I might help her up the hill. I bent down, wrapped my arm beneath and under hers and she, her bad hip and I made it up that daunting incline. She began to cry at one point after A had called to make sure I was not crying and we stopped talking about that surgery and painful recovery. Asunción. I am twice her size but still humbled by being made to go slowly. An offering of a kiss, two, a cradling of my face and a blessing of my life and smile.

What have I done to deserve such treasures?

And I am reminded of that strength.

new.

2010-03-13T17:00:00.001-08:00

We have a few Aussie friends staying with us and have been exploring music videos on YouTube. Some of the selected:

WTF, Ok Go

Gospel with no Lord, Camille

Haus am See, Peter Fox

Chicago, Sufjan Stevens

one.

2010-03-12T16:53:00.000-08:00

nevermind.

light and line.

2010-03-11T00:49:00.000-08:00

I have peeled myself from my apartment, that happy shell that holds me when I most need it, in a uniting of two things: a love for the 6.30pm sunlight in this neighborhood around this time of year and a curiosity for the 1915-1950's construction jobs and current demolition jobs around here.

thinking on holland.

2010-03-09T03:46:00.001-08:00

Dear Theo,

The path is narrow, therefore we must be careful. You know how others have arrived where we want to go, let us take that simple road too.

Ora et Labora, [Pray and work] let us do our daily work, whatever the hand finds to do, with all our strength and let us believe that God will give good gifts, a part that will not be taken away, to those who ask Him for it.

“Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold all things are become new!” [2 Cor. v.17.]

Your loving brother,

Vincent

march 1, 2010.

2010-03-02T10:50:00.000-08:00

It is winter and these trees are bare. They stand in a straight line along the basketball court and one wonders what they would look like covered in green. Only one brown and crumpled leaf has yet to fall and bunches of what I know to be “gum-drops” cling on like soggy and tired grapes. Emotions greatly influence how trees are personified, their bodies often so much like our own that it is easily done, and the up-right branches, the consequence of poor trimming, that previously felt scream-like now only speak to me of growth. Coming out of the mother trunk they take a turn, going left or going right in a violent manner as is true with all separations. Cleaving; there is a strong pulling away, a need to identify one’s self as different from the source, but never a complete and utter break. To hack it off would be to cut off the life source. After that initial change in movement these branches go vertical, after perhaps choosing to tie themselves in knots, dive into themselves, collide with others, but always up. A straight leap for the sky. Is what I previously took as panic just the result of self-preservation and individual growth?

Antoni Gaudi.La Sagrada Familia interior.

still standing.

2010-02-24T23:57:00.000-08:00

Be Thou my vision, O Lord of my heart;
Naught be all else to me, save that Thou art.
Thou my best thought, by day or by night,
Waking or sleeping, Thy presence my light.

Be Thou my Wisdom, Thou my true Word;
I ever with Thee, Thou with me, Lord;
Thou my great Father, I thy true son;
Thou in me dwelling, and I with Thee one.

Be Thou my battle-shield, sword for my fight,
Be Thou my dignity, Thou my delight.
Thou my soul's shelter, Thou my high tower.
Raise Thou me heavenward, O Power of my power.

Riches I heed not, nor man's empty praise,
Thou mine inheritance, now and always:
Thou and Thou only, first in my heart,
High King of heaven, my Treasure Thou art.

High King of heaven, my victory won,
May I reach heaven's joys, O bright heav'ns Son!
Heart of my own heart, whatever befall,
Still be my vision, O ruler of all.

right...

2010-02-24T08:17:00.000-08:00

how did we move from this...

...to the images that we have have of women today?

Is this the same stripping away at something to get to the essence?

On a brighter note...Flemish painting! I am heading to Amsterdam, Brussels, Ghent, Paris and Montpellier for the sacred week leading up to Easter. Should be a good time.

around here.

2010-02-09T10:28:00.000-08:00

"Habit is another name for discipline" F. Zobel

january 18, 2010.

2010-02-05T09:23:00.000-08:00

But J's remaining behind and B's comments about their marriage were jarring. My heart and life have purpose, I can feel it. And I don't want to think that people change and I don't want to believe that many people are not really committed or in love. Pessimism or something akin to depression grows inside me and I long to hole up and remain alone forever. We make more sense when we are alone, the questions are less and more easily answered, but God creates us as communal creatures. I must socialize and I must love. Everything within me screams it."

february 1, 2010.

2010-02-04T14:32:00.000-08:00

"I saw traffic function in it's intended rhythm this morning and then a woman in red stockings. The green light came with a rush of cars and all had passed by the time the light again blinked into red. In that moment all stood still, the oncoming traffic held at bay by the previous light and as I finished crossing they came in to fill the empty space I had left behind. We all have empty spaces to fill and form does not always obey function. Tree-trimmers in this city lop off the tops and leave branches to recreate themselves; they thus shoot straight up, in a visual panic, and freak-out as perhaps only trees can. The result is screeching fingers on the chalkboard, frantic brakes on wet pavement. And so many lives running around here below. How do we organize ourselves?"

zobel and setting.

2010-02-01T09:55:00.000-08:00

The sun sets right at 6.30pm and though there is never anyone up here with me, the buildings are present, their faces ablaze with the burn of the sunset. A strange view. Open industrial mouth with mountains for lips. I never put my house keys in the same place and I procrastinate with grocery shopping. I procrastinate with a lot of things, like mailing letters and writing them, because they seem so small in comparison with things like flaming tongues of sun-fire.

I bought stamps on the way home. Got stuck behind a girl and her father who were choosing some 20-odd lollipops, Coca-cola, strawberries and cream, and who were reminding me that small really is big, huge, gigantic. In the eyes of the beholder. And so a small thing like procrastination and mailing two postcards in February instead of in December turned something forgotten into something lividly present. I noticed her postcards were written in english and she noticed I needed stamps for the States. Another replaced New Yorker and her Californian son attended the school I now teach in. Wandering down Bravo Murillo, her so called "stomping grounds", L and I talked about marriage and learning from heartache and misplacement and teaching. Her makeup and jacket/sweater combo reminded me of a jacket that I had bought at Savers in La Mirada (or is it another town?) for some 80's themed get-together. She and I sat down, waited for her friend and when she arrived, L grabbed my arms, kissed my cheeks and blessed my journey. Enjoy it, these are good and ripe moments. Enough procrastinating said I, the blessed one, and so I bought groceries and came home. Sunset. Things go down and others come up behind you.

all'alba vincerò.

2010-01-29T02:52:00.000-08:00

For You light my lamp
The LORD my God illumines my darkness
He makes my feet like hinds' feet
And sets me upon my high places
He trains my hands for battle
So that my arms can bend a bow of bronze.
You have also given me the shield of Your salvation
And Your right hand upholds me
And Your gentleness makes me great
You enlarge my steps under me
And my feet have not slipped. Ps 18:28-36

just started to snow.

2010-01-27T07:37:00.001-08:00

(Pink Snow, Peter Doig, 1991)

"'When I look over the rooftops of Frankfurt in the middle of the night, I sense that the world and my life are not without purpose. I hear sounds inside me...It may just have to do with the fear of getting old and dying,' Ka said with embarrassment. 'If I were an author and Ka were a character in a book, I'd say, 'Snow reminds Ka of God!' But I'm not sure it would be accurate. What brings me close to God is the silence of snow.'" (from: Snow by Orhan Pamuk)

january 23, 2010.

2010-01-25T09:55:00.000-08:00

"I had the incredible feeling yesterday while walking home that everything, the whole world, was in rhythm, on beat, on time and in step. The Truman Show. She walked by me right as he turned the corner and the older man closed his large windows right as the sun finished its pounding on the tiles. And I was right there in it, on the same track; we were heading towards the same great something."

Pursuing a Goal by Czeslaw Milosz:
In order to accomplish something, one must dedicate oneself to it totally, so much that our fellow men cannot even imagine such an exclusivity. And that does not mean at all the amount of time consumed. There are also the innumerable emotional subterfuges practiced toward oneself, slow transformations of personality, as if one supreme goal, beyond one's will and knowledge, pulled in a single direction and organized destiny.

"Fill the loneliness of my broken spirit as the light fills this livingroom, help me to ache for the right things. Spirit occupy his body, cover his mind and heart. Be with us all, our Vision."

hope.

2010-01-23T02:32:00.000-08:00

Ma quando vien lo sgelo
il primo sole è mio
il primo bacio dell'aprile è mio!
il primo sole è mio!

But when the thaw comes
The first sunshine is mine
The first kiss of April is mine!
The first sunshine is mine!

thoughts about Joan Miró and Salvador Dalí.

2010-01-22T04:59:00.000-08:00

Compositional opposites; hard to believe they were influenced by many of the same factors, at the same time and in the same cities/countries. Their investigations of space; Miró explores space compositionally, a small form and a large form creates the visual idea of distancing.

Dalí explores space in a fracturing, realistic, dream dimension where a form never completely forgets it's origin. A body remains a body, however stretched it may be.

They are certainly both experimenting, repeatedly, and although Miró sculpted, wove, drew and assemblaged (if that can be a verb) he feels much more a painter than Dalí. Is that his commitment to the mark, the agressive ability of a brush to carve and scar a canvas? Dalí looked for flatness, even when creating illusionistic depth in painting. That separation is felt even in his installations; he has left the scene while Miró remains present.

"that is the difference between poetry and prose. Living as a poet means feeling that ecstasy every day of your life, every hour if possible. A poem flies out of the post like a spark...With one of two fewer words the poem would leap straight up into the sky." R. Bly from "Lorca & Jimenez"

biola takes spain.

2010-01-13T10:17:00.000-08:00

we're on our way north tomorrow.

why should the shadows fall.

2009-12-15T12:03:00.000-08:00

no judging.

2009-11-11T10:17:00.000-08:00

But I will be the first to admit that I turn my nose up at Etsy.com with it's artsy slouch and crafty walk. Full of so-called "trendy patterns" of bird silhouettes and lace the whole bit heavily redundant. And then I find myself in the middle of fall here in Madrid and longing for hand thrown pottery, the kind that weighs in your hand and that transfers the heat of your tea to your hand, and BAM!!! the world announces that a dear friend Erin Cartmell is selling her pottery...on Etsy.

Conclusion? I have decided to throw judgment to the wind alongside up-turned noses.

In other news. The current flow of internet (company:Orange) that I am utilizing to post this blog has been hard won and I am proud to announce that I have internet at my apartment! As I just wrote to my grandfather, small victories become big ones when performed in another language.

the new studio.

2009-11-10T05:22:00.001-08:00

new beginnings, observations.

In my beginning is my end. In succession
Houses rise and fall, crumble, are extended,
Are removed, destroyed, restored, or in their place
Is an open field, or a factory, or a by-pass.
Old stone to new building, old timber to new fires,
Old fires to ashes, and ashes to the earth
Which is already flesh, fur and faeces,
Bone of man and beast, cornstalk and leaf.
Houses live and die: there is a time for building
And a time for living and for generation
And a time for the wind to break the loosened pane
And to shake the wainscot where the field-mouse trots
And to shake the tattered arras woven with a silent motto.

(eliot. from::east coker.)

finalmente...

2009-11-10T05:11:00.000-08:00

New home! A few images....

Madrid, Spain...a German and an American...we moved in at the beginning of September.

l. gordillo.

2009-10-21T08:19:00.001-07:00

A brilliant, hurtful, warm, aggressive, comfortable, sweet, luxurious, decadent, sense of the absurd.

A metallic, repetitive, comfortable, relaxed, technical, geometric, sensual, perverse sense of the absurd.
An aggressive, ridiculous, shameful, awkward, infantile, programmatic, shitty, racy sense of humor.

"young professional"...

2009-09-24T08:37:00.000-07:00

...an oxymoron.

"Para lo que valga: ´I myself remember when I thought my pursuits of Art a kind of criminal dissipation amd neglect of the main chance, which I hid my face for not being able to abandon as a passion which is forbidden by Law and Religion, but now it appears to be Law and Gospel too...´ -W. Blake" (from: F. Zòbel, Diaris, vol. III)

disappearances.

2009-09-22T07:09:00.000-07:00

Who is it that bites at my eyes, who winks at me through the keyhole of the rooftop door and who turns the sky yellow when I round the corner?

I have been back in Madrid for six weeks and have found and moved into my apartment and studio, have begun teaching english conversation and learning how to teach, have started my internship with the Fundaciòn Juan March working with the journals of Fernando Zòbel and am just now getting the hang of it. My days are beautiful, busy and I crave the time to sit down and draw, write letters, read, make sense of all of this. It all hurdles forward and suddenly the distance between "then" and "now" grows. And I am older, more mature, able to handle responsibilities, finances and to be put in charge of things and people. I miss simplicity and yet still find it; find it in the late afternoon when my day is done, find it in Riccardo´s child-like smile as we wearily greet one another for dinner, find it in that winking keyhole, in the words of friends I miss so painfully.

I have been reading Eliot, avoiding the internet and not really listening to music. We are entering fall, globally, and here the leaves crinkle and the wind shifts. Shifting, changes occur, Mary Poppins leaves on that wind and we read of flaming tounges.

It is J. Rose who empties Connecticut water into my dry eyes, the sun who fills the hole of the aluminum door as I climb the stairs and God who turns the empty to yellow with warm breath as I turn onto my street.

And I am still here, un-disappeared and opening up to regurgitate what I am seeing, feeling, doing...just wait.

thinking of :: jamie and madrid.

2009-08-15T19:00:00.000-07:00

So here I am, in the middle way, having had twenty years-
Twenty years largely wasted, the years of l'entre deax guerres
Trying to learn to use words, and every attempt
Is a wholly new start, and a different kind of failure
Because one has only learnt to get the better of words
For the thing one no longer has to say, or the way in which
One is no longer disposed to say it. And so each venture
Is a new beginning, a raid on the inarticulate
With shabby equipment always deteriorating
In the general mess of imprecision of feeling,
Undisciplined squads of emotion. And what there is to
conquer
By strength and submission, has already discovered
Once or twice, or several times, by men whom one cannot
hope
To emulate-but there is no competition-
There is only the fight to recover what has been lost
And found and lost again and again; and now, under
conditions
That seem unpropitious. But perhaps neither gain nor loss.
For us, there is only the trying. The rest is not our business.

-t.s. eliot

the cove and mom's bread.

2009-08-14T00:54:00.000-07:00

Green boat in the blood-turned Nile. I have just returned home from watching "The Cove", a recently released documentary focusing on the abolition of dolphin hunting and massacre in Taiji, Japan. Join me for a few moments while we sit here, cup of tea, blue skirt and my mother's raisin bread.

So, we have not lost our hunter/gather mentality. Our ability to lie, cheat and murder. Our love of the game, the desire to win and to feel higher than another power. Blood-lust. We love to yell, belittle and feel a part of something. It is painful and primitive to watch and yet somehow I feel numb. It feels so far and so false. I do not want to believe that we do such things for such trivial things, money, food, consumption and because of borders, languages, economies. My world shrinks in on itself.

And we could throw our arms up, declare that we will purge the sea of fish in the next few decades and then decide on alternative food sources but do we really want to make that declaration? And does asking "what does my life mean in all of that?" mean something? I think that a readiness does. A preparedness of self, of feet ready for flight and hands ready to work for this thing we occupy, this life giving source.

Lord I pray for sensitivity, for the weight of the world to be significant upon our shoulders and for a burden for this created environment.

nocturna de moguer.

2009-08-08T22:55:00.000-07:00

Los árboles no están solos
que están con sus sombras.
El alma sí que está sola.

La luna echa en el valle
su entera plata redonda.
Una viña de ceniza
florea la estrella loca.

Las colinas no andan solas
que andan con sus aires.
El alma sí que anda sola.

El mundo se oye silbar,
lo acompanañan caracolas.
El mar, en redondo abrazo
de hombre y mujer, se roba.

Y los ríos no van solos
que van con sus ondas.
El alma sí que va sola.

JR Jimenez

Jimènez and Matisse.

2009-06-25T04:03:00.000-07:00

de La Colina de Platero y yo

Y yo estoy cierto, Platero, de que ahora no estoy aquì, contigo, ni nunca en donde estè, ni en la tumba, ya muerto; sino en la colina roja, clàsica a un tiempo y romàntica, mirando, con un libro en la mano, ponerse el sol sobre el rìo...

from The Hill from Platero and I

And I am certain, Platero, that right now I am not here, with you, nor am I ever where I am, nor in the tomb, now dead; but on the red hill, once classic and romantic, watching, with a book in hand, the sun place itself over the river...

heat.

2009-06-15T13:51:00.000-07:00

Madrid heats up somewhere between 10 and 10:30 and my sun-burnt arms beneath their long sleeves are wanting freedom. In this light we forget that it ever was cold, the feeling of snow and rain. The large department stores hustle to put out sandals, shorts, linen. We all look for skirts, sleeveless tops and the price of sunscreen is ridiculously high. The light is paint and we are all followed by some hand painting it in and painting it out in large, thick gestures. A forehead, a young boy´s scrawny arms, the tops of knees, a woman´s shoulder in a flowery blouse. I have always preferred to paint the lights, the hot colors and bright tones, perhaps they are easier to see or perhaps my soul is the same in intensity. A hot soul.

the spanish nanny. graduated.

2009-06-01T06:00:00.000-07:00

I have just accepted an english conversation teaching position for this next academic year here in Madrid. This means that yes, I am graduated from a year as an english speaking nanny of sorts to an english speaker who is teaching english speaking.

Now, I have a month before I return home. I am going to draw like mad. I want to have a wee exhibition. Just so that you know, just so that I know that I have now written those words. Now let´s turn the verb "to want" into "to do". Action verbs!

cambios.

2009-05-14T10:37:00.000-07:00

This afternoon I went again to the park but this time alone; I wanted to see the chesnut flowers up close. Their flowers are drying up, bursting open and pulling back to reveal tiny, bright, green, spiky chesnuts. In the area of the park where I was, the diagonal side entrance, the wind is strong and the ground beneath the castaño forest is littered with these marble sized wonders. With my fingernails I pinch one open, wondering it if had already formed it´s hard, inner surface. No. I was an intruder and performing a sort of early autopsy.

He´s always been faithful, He will be again. With the spring, with newness, comes the awkward shedding of skin. Becoming completely new is not easy, no one has ever said that it was. But we have seen these patterns before.

I am alone in the house this weekend and pretending it is mine, pretending that I do not have to figure out food, shelter, love, where to put my books in less than two months. Pretending I say! And so, I will be burying my face in the Reina Sofia exhibition catalog of Juan Muñoz (currently on display...I have yet to see it).

Been thinking about: Easter, regeneration, green, openings, the bending arches of trees and bodies and cathedrals, footsteps and cambios. Changes.

back from oslo.

2009-04-21T06:39:00.000-07:00

I spent this past week in Oslo, Norway at the invitation of Biola´s very own Karen Riddervold. My eyes have never seen so much in one trip, what a blessed feast for the eyes is Oslo! Madrid has never been so green and the chestnut trees are in bloom. But here, a pear tree and a few words from the north.

Oslo. We have so much water she said, and it´s incredible and bursting forth. The snow is melting, flooding the hillside and rushing to the sea in drips, flows and gurgles. Sounding. This moment the sun is hidden but all is light and gray. We went on a long walk past homes, all big and beautiful, the fjord noticeable between their sides; those architectural forms marked by historic influence. Those ancient Viking ships turned square, topped with a roof and occupied once more. Our feet turned from the asphalt to a snowy path, dirty and spotted with horse hooves, trees, a forest-city, a city-forest, the two at once. The importance of silence and I wanted to be writing in the moment, my eyes coursing over the landscape like a lover, my ears catching like nets the songs of the birds, insect-like in their numbers. The Oslo fjord is wherever I turn, changing it´s shape, growing larger and widening, glacier carved and savage; a gaping mouth, lapping at the city and moving ferries with it´s tongue.

barcelona.

2009-04-21T05:45:00.000-07:00

in strawberry season.

2009-03-23T09:43:00.000-07:00

In winter we eat mandarines. In spring we eat strawberries. In summer...well, we shall see what Madrileños eat then.

Yet again without a computer, things such as writing simple essays for class have become very strenuous. Writings about Barcelona and plans on staying another year here soon...and sooner than that, new work. Keep making work friends!

barcelona and absences.

2009-03-16T07:16:00.000-07:00

There is a woman who is always pacing the Metro station at Republica Argentina. Graying, long, curly hair, a strange grin, hands behind her back, a long plaid coat... she falls into my periphery. I´ve no idea who she is. I go down the escalator and see her ghost from the corner of my eye tumbada on the stairs in-between the sets of moving ones. We woud thicken if we exchanged looks, if we were to say to one another, yes, I see you every day.
Cassandra asked me if she has changed, if she had thickened. Our lives slide alongside of one another and we are the ones who choose to look or to not look. Just like these trains. This changing wind of Hans Zimmer. She has changed and I begin to draw her in my mind. Beginning with the shadow in the inner pocket of the eye, just like Jon Puls.
These images weigh on me, I must learn to draw weight. Heavy, light, change. The faux fur on the hood in front of me moves in the breeze but we are in-doors, underground. From where do these things come?

I recieved a postcard from the States today, from Sydney, asking about the weather in the Spanish abyss I have fallen into. Well, I live and breathe and am heading to Barcelona this weekend for four days of adventure and solitude. Breathing and living!

bells and Bilbao.

2009-02-18T06:05:00.000-08:00

And this life, this sunlight, these Spanish word, this silver pen which used to be his, go bouncing around, attempting to seduce, to slay, to include me in their giddy romp. It seems to me such a beautiful thing to study a language, this language. Thinking of Jimènez, Las campanas de la torre estàn sonando en nuestro pecho, al nivel de nuestro corazòn, que late fuerte. (The tower bells are sounding in our chest, at the level of our heart, what a strong beat/that beats strongly.)and me, leaning my elbows on the dusty, cold sill of the fourth story balcony. The only witness of today´s one o´clock ringing. The day rings for me, harmonizing with the iron bell hung from my throat whose sides beat heavily on the inner ribs of my ribs. 18-2-2009

Bilbao. The train took us through rain, blue sky, forests and green hills, up and up towards more snow and then Bilbao with it´s confused skies. There is a word for the mists that fall so finely, like silk curtains, but it is a strange and ticklish word that I have forgotten. We arrived, collected ourselves, found a map and walked down the street, over a brige which crosses the River Nerviòn and then followed that very river. We followed it´s curves and vientos, passing bridges and bridges, all so different and yet strangely related. I caught my breath when a strange, Dr. Seuss puente came to my eyes and then Frank Gehry began to sing. The Guggenheim Bilbao is situated right on the river, it´s curves creating the medium between rainy skies and wet earth. In the rain, and I have not seen it otherwise, it is genius, simple and so utterly primitive yet sophisticated. A huge thing, a sculpted building, màs una escultura como las por sus alrededores que un edificio, and so naturally so. 8-2-2009

AND SO.

2009-01-20T01:55:00.000-08:00

I am back in Madrid without my own computer. And so, now you know. This fact will explain a lot of things such as unanswered emails, a few extra hours of free time for me and a rarely updated blog. But really, it is kind of nice to not have my 5 year old Mac PowerBook with me...

My New Year´s Resolutions have something to do with Nesbit and with living, breathing, loving, drawing and writing.

¨But now, all ignorant of the length
of time´s uncertain wing,
It goads me, like the goblin bee,
That will not state it´s sting.¨-E.D.

Mary and her Christ child.

2008-12-25T15:15:00.000-08:00

"The power which resides in him is new in nature, and none but he knows what that is which he can do, nor does he know until he has tried...God will not have his work made manifest by cowards. A man is relieved and gay when he has put his heart into his work and done his best; but what he has said or done otherwise shall give him know peace."

I occupied the role of Mary in a Nativity scene last night, Christmas Eve, and thought about the word "blessing." That Mary was Blessed. To carry Christ in her body was a Blessing and this is the Blessing which we now receive. We are Blessed to choose to occupy the roles that Christ sets before us, to make his work, his life, manifest in our own. A Merry and Holy Christmas to all. Christ is born!

helena almeida at fundación telefonica.

2008-12-08T06:39:00.000-08:00

Two days ago I visited the Fundación Telefonica, on Grand Via, and the exhibition of Helena Almeida "Tela Rosa Para Vestir", curated by Isabel de Carlos. Helena Almeida (b. 1934) is a contemporary artist from Lisboa, Portugual who's work seduced me from the get-go. Trained as a painter, Almeida's work dances between photography and painting. Somewhere in the late 60's she felt "the temptation to put the work 'on top' of [her]" and she did just that. She wore wore a canvas on her chest as one does a shirt and someone, perhaps her husband who is her often if not always the one who captures the image, took a picture.

All paintings are, in one sense or another, a self-portrait, a record of the one who painted. In Almeida's case, and here I speculate, that connection was not sufficient and so she flipped the table and combined mediums. The camera allows for formal studies of the body and for painting back into, or on top of, the image. These photo-paintings are, for me, the strongest, the punchiest, of the shown work and combine the strength of both mediums.

There are a number of works in which the artist is depicted interacting with black powder which takes the form of her shadow or that of something leaving her body.

"el dibujo en sí mismo no es suficiente. Inmediatamente tienes que entrar en otra dimensión, moverte hacia otra área de lenguaje artístico."

Drawing in itself is not sufficient. Immediately you have to enter into another dimention, to move yourself into another area of artistic language.

headache.

2008-12-07T13:56:00.000-08:00

I am the carrier of a four-day headache,...the thing just will not go away...this blog has turned into a writing blog because taking photos is just so dang hard and it is 8 degree C and raining in Madrid. Loneliness and excessive coffee drinking are side affects of a damp climate.

This image may not mean anything to you but it is what I look at everyday from my window.

Reading: Doce Cuentos Peregrinos por Gabriel García Márquez; Comer, Rezar, Amor por Elizabeth Gilbert; la poesia de Pureza Canelo.

Listening to: Brahms, Iron and Wine, Jorge Drexler.

11-27-08.

2008-11-27T09:31:00.001-08:00

It is Thanksgiving Day. I have been to church to listen to the 2008 President’s Proclamation of Thanksgiving (George W. Bush), visited Madrid’s American Store to smell the pumpkin pies and walked home.

My friend and I have a continuing conversation concerning personal rights, liberty and the separation of church and state in our home turf. America is a country founded by religious persons who were searching for freedom, religious freedom. If a government is to be hands off, as liberal as possible so as to allow each citizen to “do as you please” without the interference of the so-called conservative, Christian founded government, then how do we make any decisions? Morality, human stuff, is mixed in on both sides, I do not care what vocabulary is used to define it.

California just passed a law revoking it’s earlier legalizing of homosexual marriage. I believe in the rights of a person and I believe that it is not my right to dictate life of another human being. (These are my opinions, spoken cautiously but with conviction.) One has the right to live as they chose. The other also has the right to voice their opinion and to have that opinion be turned into an active vote as constitutionally declared. So in American, a country that greatly values, and at least strives to uphold, its democracy and its freedom, we have a dilemma. If my friend is right, that there can ever be a clean break between the church and the state, however one might defines those terms, them someone always loses politically. There are two sides and one declared winner. I think it a nice idea, the attempt to clean up, to delineate to avoid recommitting previous errors, but too simple.

But perhaps Cathy was right this morning when she spoke of peace, that we agree to disagree, and in that lies freedom. We have made a decision to put a black family in the President’s House, a decision that makes me proudly blubber like a newborn. I embrace the day when I can sit myself down next to a black man on the Metro and not flash through hundreds of years of American history, but maybe that is what I should be doing. Remembering and loving. Loving and embracing. Embracing and giving thanks. Happy Thanksgiving to you all.

“O beautiful for patriot dream that sees beyond the years, thine alabaster cities gleam undimmed by human tears! America! America! God mend thine every flaw, confirm thy soul in self control, thy liberty in law.”

mixing colors.

2008-11-26T06:56:00.000-08:00

“Muy lentamente, volvió la cabeza y miró a Shmuel, que ya no lloraba sino que tenía los ojos fijos en el suelo; parecía tratar de convencer su alma para que saliera de su cuerpecito, flotara hacia la puerta y se elevara por el cielo, deslizándose a través de las nubes hasta estar muy lejos de allí.”

a gisted translation: Very slowly, he turned his head and looked at Shmuel, who was not crying but who had his eyes fixed on the floor; he seemed to try to convince his spirit to leave his little body, to float towards the door and to carry itself for the sky, slipping through the clouds until it was far away from there.

(from El niño con el pijama de rayas, by John Boyne)

Si hubieras conocido a Juan, te habrías enamorado de él.- There is something strangely nostalgic and saddening in speaking of "could-have-beens." Is it wrong to look back and imagine what might have happened...if only...

Jimena and I are learning to combine two colors to make third, tertiary, colors. Madrid is COLD and I am thinking about...extra postage, poetry, New York, Paul Klee, RB Kitaj, arrows, layers, lines, opposites. Will post some more drawings soon....te lo prometo!

víktor pivovárov.

2008-11-19T14:23:00.000-08:00

Víktor Pivovárov
Croquis para objetos de uso cotidiano de un hombre solitario
(Plan for the Everday Objects of a Lonely Man, 1975)

This piece is one of a group of 171x130x4 cm panels entitled, as a series, Projects for the Lonely Man. Currently this piece, along with 5 others, is on display at the Fundaciòn Juan March in Madrid, link is located on the sidebar.

The instructions are to be read and followed by said Lonely Man.

Book
A book may be:
1. read,
2. leafed through,
3. looked through,
4. stroked,
5. given to another lonely person to read.

Desk Lamp
1. For reading a book,
2. For pleasant lighting,
3. For examining one's reflections in the windowpane in the evening.

revolviendo en mi cabeza.

2008-11-18T13:54:00.000-08:00

los objetos de uso cotidiano de un hombre solitario.

what is America to me?

2008-11-10T06:48:00.000-08:00

I was recently told that I look very American. This is true, I am and feel very American...tall, broad-shouldered, fast-walking, taking bad pictures of myself on airplanes, American.
I miss: Pumpkin pie, dental floss, carne asada burritos and Mexican tortillas, the Pacific, understanding cultural jokes.

I love: The chill of Madrid in fall, Spanish tortillas, leather boots, yellow sunlight, rain, chestnuts, a clean Metro system, the Prado.

it is early.

2008-11-02T01:16:00.000-07:00

Trust in the Lord and do good;
Dwell in the land and cultivate faithfulness. (psalm 37)

I do not wish to expiate, but to live. My life is for itself and not for a spectacle. I much prefer that it should be of a lower strain, so it be genuine and equal, than that it should be glittering and unsteady. (self-reliance. emerson)

chasing goya...and self.

2008-10-26T11:16:00.000-07:00

An old Word document I just came across- I am Interested in:

"I am interested in cross-cultural exchange, especially in the Tijuana-San Diego Border, as well as in the relations between Spain and North America and their past interactions. Do ties still remain? If and if not, can I be a tie of some sort? Goya painted himself into historical scenes, and so what does that imply? What will I be implying/exploring by plugging myself, a young, female, American, into Spanish culture? The awkwardness of painting, and the ability to ask questions and approach other, possibly difficult, subjects.

Self–portraiture and its history in Spanish Painting.

I am interested in identity construction. One’s identity and definition of self are bound up in interactions with physical objects and environments. In studying Goya’s painting and self-portraiture and acting as a link between contemporary culture and the ideas represented in his work.

I am interested in the collision of spaces. Cultural and social borders, globalization...the manifestation of the “third space” in painting. The meeting of realism and abstraction, of the ground of the canvas with the new ground that is being asserted by the artist. The dialogue between the painter/artist and the paint/medium.

I am interested in the human body, its form and function. Our rejection of bodily excretions: vomit, tears, urine, sweat, feces…we do not choose to possess it, to claim it as our own though it is our own creation. As artists we take the world in though ourselves, and spit it back out through medium of brush, camera, hammer and ceramic wheel etc. Should we not accept these other creations that truly and physically traverse the length of our intestinal system?"

Goya was deaf and a bit batty when he created the Desastres and when he painted the Black Paintings. There are times I feel I will go mad from hearing my own voice in my head. I cannot image the thousands that were revolving around in his. Where else could a deaf man live but between lines and images? I would equally have had to get empty those voices from my head. And so: I am interested in making art in a Spanish context, but why? I am interested in Goya's self preservation through self portraiture, but why did he do it? I am interested in my emotionality, my reactions to the work and my ability to observe, but what should anyone give me money to study that?

These are the questions, and then some!, that I will be pursing these coming months. For now, I am exhausted and off to bed.

the only drawings I have done in over a month.

2008-10-18T14:06:00.000-07:00

yes.

impressive and expressive.

2008-10-18T11:01:00.000-07:00

All big museums put on large shows of Impressionist painting, the pretty stuff that will bring in tourists and makes all the educated folk lift their noses still higher to avoid the stench. Sometimes a shameless march through salon after salon of Degas, Sorolla, Monet, Klee, Nolde and their peers is a good idea.

The exhibition at El Museo Thyssen, 1914! La vanguardia y la gran guerra, is presented very simply as the topic at hand is a heavy one. Hung on green walls, a color often used by the painters exhibited, are a manageable number of paintings ranging from 1911-1917 give or take a year. Short poems, presented in their original German and in translations, are mounted alongside certain works. These words proudly announce the Futurists belief that war is the "world's hygiene" and progressively deteriorates into the converse. Some of the treasures this winding exhibit has to offer are 12 of Ossip Zadkine's "20 Etchings of the War", "Small Tree in Late Autumn" by Egon Schiele and Emil Nolde's "Soldiers" which reminded me of the wall of soldiers printed in 1918 by George Bellows. Picasso's heavy shoulder is ever present amongst the fracturing images.

La Fundación Mapfre, a non-profit arts foundation in Madrid, is currently presenting the work of Degas, Del proceso a la creación. A nice little collection of work, the best of which are his sketches and the small painting Le foyer de la danse à l’Opéra
de la rue Le Peletier, 1872. The rest falls into repetition. Upstairs is another exposition, Entre dos siglos: España 1900, a presentation of a select and often neglected group of Spanish painters who built the bridge from traditional to modern Spanish painting. A large blue room of Sorolla's paintings literally steals the entire cake and Verano, 1904, in particular. I had a delightful encounter with Santiago Rusiñol (1861-1931) and the handful of paintings of his presenting women who just might have been stolen from the French past or the American future.
(Grand Ball, 1891)

Córdoba.

2008-10-17T13:50:00.001-07:00

An ave is a bird and apparently an AVE is a highspeed Spanish train, the sort that fly from Madrid to Córdoba. After two days of being caught between German, English and Spanish, of touching stone carved in the 10th century and 100 year old tobacco drying caves, of incredible weather and nearly indecipherable Andalusian accents we headed back to Madrid. Felix is an archeologist working to excavate the site of a 10th century palace, the ancient home of a Muslim califa. The complex water systems he is uncovering are like organic termite tunnels and all lead to a main basin that would have fed into the house, the animal stalls and the extensive gardens.

On the same parallel, the same hillside, is nested Madinat al-Zahra and at the risk of sounding like a tourist with a year’s subscription to National Geographic – wow. This site, much larger, is in constant repair- a job which I cannot imagine. Arabic decoration is unmistakably beautiful and painstakingly intricate. Pieces from the facades are scattered all across the hillside.

La catedral de Córdoba. Go visit it yourself. I just want to somehow record how it felt walking in such a sacred and historic place…I feel as though I dreamt the whole thing. To be in the heart of that maze, en el fondo of a building that has been utilized for centuries and centuries of worship, regardless of the deity, to see the Catholic religion literally stacked on top of, grown into the Muslim architecture...how did I feel? I could not breathe. Humanity. Our constant reaching into the past, to touch our primal selves, while constantly reaching upwards and pushing each other out of the way to do so. These pictures are ridiculous but perhaps provide a small comparison of the difference in elaborate décor.

The Fundación Juan March recently opened a new exhibition of contemporary Russian art, El Museo Prado opened a large exhibition of Rembrandt narrative paintings and the Museo Thyssen opened an exhibition titled 1914!, which covers the years of the first World War.

jeff wall....Wall-e....pared.

2008-10-08T12:19:00.000-07:00

I am finally introduced to Jeff Wall, who's name I have know for a long time but who's work I did not, by a book published in 2007 by NY MoMA appropriately titled Jeff Wall.
Dead Troops Talk (a vision after an ambush of a Red Army Patrol, near Moqor, Afghanistan, winter 1986), 1992.

A Sudden Gust of Wind (after Hokusai), 1993.

These weird narrated scenes, generally pulled back to contextualize, are striking to me and by striking I mean "Ow!". My thoughts go deeper on the matter but I am tired.
Insomnia, 1994.

Side note: Jimena vomited all night long, spent the day home with me but still went to see Grease, in Spanish, with her mother tonight. I am left to think of those things for which I would, after vomiting forth my entire self, I would still stand up, get dressed and go out for. So far: John Mayer. A reviewing of Olafur Eliasson's show at the SF MoMA. Merion Este's lecture at Biola University. The American presidential election. The NY Philharmonic or the LA Symphony. Baja. Spanish hot chocolate. A midnight showing of White Christmas.

aprovechar-to take advantage of.

2008-10-05T12:29:00.000-07:00

Aprovechar is a verb that I am having the toughest time with, equivocarse also, as it is used in many many MANY situations. To seize an opportunity, such as free time, to do something.

It is Sunday, a holy day set aside for setting aside, for abiding, for resting. I meant only to wander past, not inside of, but found myself in line, paying, entering and standing in front of Mars de Velázquez. His brushwork makes my stomach turn over on itself, I had forgotten how beautiful.

The Prado was designed for accidental entry, for aimless wanderings, as the salas are winding and the paintings are shielded until one if fairly on top of them. I turned a corner, saw a few painting's in Goya's recognizable hand and then openly wept as my eyes took in the 2 y 3 de mayo. No one told me they were huge, but they are huge. Two weeks ago I stood in front of the Palacio Real, the site on which began the Spanish war for Independence against Napoleonic France. There is a monument across the Paseo del Prado for the madrileños who died on 2 de mayo. There are rooms of Goya's paintings, Rubens, Murillo, a hall devoted to Ribera and oh dear Lord, Jacob's fingers in the hair on Isaac's arm. There were angels to comfort Saint Francis after he received the stigmata, to free San Pedro from his shackles and, I would like to believe one to guide me as I wander...mine was painted by Ribera of course.

Yesterday morning I fled from this silent house to Puerta del Sol, the center of Spain, and up Calle Alcalá to the Real Academia de las Bellas Artes de San Fernando. Whew, what a name. The Academia has a large collection of Spanish painting that is humbly hung in a glorious building in the heart of Madrid. A nice temporary exhibition of Goya, including that small autoretrato silhouetted against a beaming window wearing the striped leggings, and a beautiful painting of El Greco of Saint Jerome. The colors El Greco uses to depict skin are so strange, soupy, incandescent and somehow more like skin than all of those fluffy court painters who I really believe were the precursors to photorealism. His body moves, those long strokes of El Grecos brush still pull longer and longer, transparent.

On a personal note that you will just have to endure: I have been lonely for American things, people, accents, peanut butter. It is hard to spend all of my time getting to know people, getting to know this city, getting to be known, watching all of the attractive foreign couples, realizing that I have no plans in one year and that one year will go by so quickly...but I endure! What is that compared to, well, other things.

whatever.

2008-10-03T11:27:00.002-07:00

You remember that Alanis Morisette song, "And what it all comes down to is that I haven't got it all figured out just yet."

What is going on with American politics and the global economy?

joaquín sorolla.

2008-09-28T08:28:00.000-07:00

El Museo Sorolla, located off of the Paseo Castellana, is the old home of the painter Joaquín Sorolla y Bastida (1863-1923) and the current home of an enormous body of his paintings.

I had yet to see his work en vivo and was delighted to discover thick patches of bright whites, pinks and blues and thin patches of darker, somber colors. He is aptly named the painter of light, el pintor de la luz, and his paints felt to be bouncing off of the surface of my face, my retinas. The middle figure of the sleeping girl in this second image, Trata de blancas (1894) is a confusingly beautiful combination of blue and pink.

The two story museum/house is fairly studded with paintings hung and crammed, for the most part, salon style and thus with very little room to breathe. This is perhaps how they were intended to live, side by side like so many breathless and bright-eyed children. Exhibited are both large and petite scale works and I found myself dancing back and forth. Right inside the entrance are the quaint and beautiful gardens that Sorolla painted many times. I highly recommend multiple visits.

I am listening to Tchaikovsky and have spent the weekend watching Russian theater with Spanish subtitles in the company of a sweet Spanish grandfather. My American nationaly prepared me well with it's mush-pot of ethnicities. Little by little I find myself drawing again, pulling out of my cautious shell much like the Spanish chestnuts, castañas, that litter the streets of Madrid and my desk.

A little taste: La abuela makes her rounds with a blue towel, toallas de rayas under both sandaled feet, gray hair pulled back, small breasts sagging beneath a faded nightie, her face tired of cigarettes and her breath catching in her windpipe. Her husband sits in his sweater, showered and reading with his dictionaries spread out on the white table. The scene repeats, doubling over, as it has for over thirty years and mirrors the house from which they both fled. Fumes from her cigarette. The five-year old is unable to feed herself and you find you are clutching her little cuerpo, pleading in your indecipherable tongue and praying that you eyes give you away.

Antoni Tápies y Pablo Neruda.

2008-09-20T04:45:00.000-07:00

"Las gentes cruzan el mundo en la actualidad
sin apenas recordar que poseen un cuerpo y en él la vida,
y hay miedo, hay miedo en el mundo de las palabras que
designan el cuerpo,
y se habla favorablemente de la ropa,
de pantalones es posible hablar, de trajes,
y de ropa interior de mujer (de medias y ligas de “señora”),
como si por las calles fueran las prendas y los trajes vacíos
por completo
y un oscuro y obsceno guardarropas ocupara el mundo.

Tienen existencia los trajes, color, forma, designio,
y profundo lugar en nuestros mitos, demasiado lugar,
demasiados muebles y demasiadas habitaciones hay en el
mundo,
y mi cuerpo vive entre y bajo tantas cosas abatido,
con un pensamiento fijo de esclavitud y de cadenas."

My third week here in Cruz del Rayo, Madrid has just begun and like a good painter I forgot my camera cord. You will just have to believe me when I say that I have set up my little studio, desk space! I am only just now beginning to feel the ground beneath my feet and daring to pull out my pens and head towards the museums. I have full access to very intelligent artists, libraries of books and am, for now, sincerely overwhelmed! Change, however necessary, is incredibly painful and disorienting.

Las gentes cruzan el mundo en la actualidad sin apenas recordar que poseen un cuerpo y en él la vida-really roughly translated-People cross the world in actuality, reality, barely able to recall that they posses a body and in that body, life.