bull & venus

Well my whole "read textbook in a coffee house" cliche worked out pretty well. Read half of my Art History assignment in one sitting, and hope to finish it tomorrow. Not really hard reading just tiny print and lots of it.

Slept in way long this morning. Ibanez came in and cuddled with me a bit. Not really all that eventful. Had a nice lemonade at Starbucks, might try and find the non-conglomerate coffee place tomorrow. Had sloppy joes for dinner over at Sean's. Then we (Sean, Mike and I) watched Ravenous. Love that movie, gets better every time I see it. You won't find a better movie that stars David Arquette AND is about cannibalism. Seriously, there aren't any.

Slow day, but I need slow days. Enjoy them while I have them.

they tired to make me go to math class and I said "no, no, no"

Sean lent me volumes two and three of Preacher a few weeks ago and I laid down on the couch and started reading two. Took a little while for the plot to come back to me, been ages since I borrowed the first volume from Collier. Then Brandon came out of Lindsay's room shirtless and I went "eee" and threw the comic over my eyes. I'm glad to be in a comic circuit again, have Promethea and Akira on loan from James. As much as I'd love to spend my weekend reading comics I think I'm going to hit up a local coffee shop and get a cuppa cocoa and read me some Art History instead.

Went to PNCA today to sort out my transfer credits. I got the audit and I transferred 33 credits from Olympic College but only my Math 119 class came through and cancelled one math, there is still some lame "second' math class. There isn't any separation, no "oh this is Algebra and this is Pre-Calc" it is just "math and maybe a little bit harder math". So my options are: take math next semester, or test out of it. I was sort of hoping my Associates would enable me to skip it, but it all came down to credits and Olympic College and its 99 to 107/119 thing with no number in between left me short. So in a few months, I gotta try and remember what Kelso and Robertson taught me.

I was frustrated so I treated myself to an ice-cream cone from a super market. In the Pearl District they have a $5 minimum when it comes to purchases with debit/credit cards so I used up all my change and had just enough. Very tasty.

Dropped my roll of film off at Rite Aid (I finished up the roll earlier today). It was wound tight so they had a lot of trouble getting it set up to feed it into the machine. In the end I lost only one shot from the fumbling with getting the film to open, and it was just a shot of plants so no biggie.

Got my appointment all sorted out and rode off home at what seemed to be a very late 4:30. Lindsay was in the crosswalk when I was stopped at the light on 14th&Jefferson so I pedaled beside her as we went back to our room.

Rest of the day was spent shopping, lounging, and watching Spaced and QI. Really bad of me; hence the whole "stowing away at a coffee shop with nuthin' but my textbooks" plan for tomorrow.

Got two packages from home today. One contained lots of wonderful clothes from Rubie. Always need tees and pants, wearing some right now in fact. Thank you wonderful Rubie. The other had my old photography binder in it. Yay! Now I have my old prints and negatives.

jarMOOCH

Sean and I were watching Jim Jarmusch's Dead Man starring Johnny Depp. After what appeared to be something happening we turned it off. Oh wow after looking him up he did Ghost Dog: Way of the Samurai. I love that movie. Anyway, yeah we just couldn't stand it. The black and white seemed weird, like it is filmed in color and then made black and white. It had amazing actors but how they were directed was just sort of...odd. So anyone who has seen this movie, does it get better after Johnny Depp is revived by the "Native American" and a hit is put on him? Well not really a hit, well maybe a hit. I forget. It was so artsy that we couldn't distract ourselves by making fun of it, we felt we had to pay attention in case something happened. And when something happened we still were under-whelmed. Some fancy name is attached to it, it must be good! Reading reviews of it I kind of want to give it a second shot, we really were not in the mood for "art" movies.

So we watched The Condemned instead. Which was HORRIBLE but at least we could make fun of it the whole way through. Wouldn't recommend it. To anyone. At all, for any reason. Never thought I would turn off Johnny Depp for Vinnie Jones.

Digital Tools was hard, trying to get pictures that emphasize foreground and background..well sections of pictures and it is supposed to be black and white and abstract. Uhg. Didn't finish, isn't due until Tuesday so I will be putting in some lab time. Read some of Jim Hill's comic that he is working on; Fiasco. He has a very good comic name, Karen's full name is already a comic book name. She will have to change it.

Rode down 14th again, really easy and I can cross at a crosswalk simple enough when the bike lane disappears. Though I was on the right side and I had a green light and a car was pulling closer and closer to me and I realised they were turning, so I had to break. I think a bike lane is treated as a lane...you don't push cars out of a lane to turn, well not legally. And it was a mother with (I assume) her kids with her who almost got me. Grrr!

he first part of Drawing was spent critiquing our tree drawings. They really likes my tree, it looked as if it was blowing in the wind (apparently). Did myself real proud. Lots of good trees. So far there isn't a ban on "I Like..." yet, there will be.

Mel and I went to Tea Zone for some tea. I had this bamboo shoot flower tea (something like that) and it was really tasty but my tongue is still burned.

Then we did still life's with graphite with emphasis on the negative space. Really boring, how can we go from models and trees to cones and spheres?

Bought my film for class and pedalled home. Really bored, decided to make cookies before going over and watching Dead Man (thought it would be fun, cookies and Depp). Somewhere I failed in making the cookies, could have been some ingredient I added too much/too little or the cooking heat/time was off. They were crispy and just rather bad. Oh well, better luck next time. Tomorrow I'll make a loaf of bread.

awww

Silas from Port Townsend dropped out of PNCA.

Dang.

needs more contrast

Remember that photography class I took? Remember those prints I made? The ones that had good lights and darks and were very crisp and all that. I thought those were good, and that was my first time in the darkroom. First time with film and a non-automatic camera. I didn't even use a tripod. That photography class got me really psyched. In this photography class I spend three hours trying to get a white and a black on a single image. Five prints and none of them perfect. Kept on raising the contrast and raising the contrast and trying to keep the white which is hard when you need that dark. In the end I couldn't even get ONE good print. Looking forward to more work on Monday, might go in with Christopher over the weekend. Have to shoot another roll, whee fun.

I just don't get it. Those prints from Olympic College's photography class, I would do the test strip and figure out which second and then I'd do the print. The bonsai tree one I got on the first go, no problem. I think the one of the reeds and the water at Elandan Gardens was the first, maybe second print after the test strip. I did lots of the print that I gave to Jeanette and none of the later ones I did were quite as good as one of the first prints (that one I think came out on the second try). All of those had pure white and pure black and I did it really quick without having to fiddle about for hours on different magenta settings. I didn't even know there was a magenta setting to fiddle with. Now I can't even get a white and black on the same print unless I spill white out on a photo of of Ibanez. Hopefully with a roll of better photos I can find some success in my prints but for right now AHHHG FRUSTRATED!!

Biked down 14th instead of 12th today. Pretty nice straight shoot, though the bike lane on the left disappears and reappears on the right for some reason.

2D design was frustrating. AND on top of the whole printing fiasco I had to show Richard and James how to make prints/develop prints/explain the enlarger/all this other stuff because the teacher...I dunno what she was doing but I guess she didn't want to re-give the lecture to people who miss class. I tried my best to explain, I hope they get it.

My performance piece, also of the "uhg" variety. Two members were late in coming and I was almost thinking we would have had to give our performance with two people playing four roles which actually might have made it better than the quick, almost skit-ish piece we did give. Okay sure no one else had any ideas so I can't really diss the idea itself. We went first and it was really really short. A minute shorter than it was required to be, and it was required to be 2-3 minutes. Then there was a critique and it was really nice how people managed to get some meaning out of it. The next two were pretty amazing pieces, really well thought out and I could see me seeing them at TBA:08. I wish so many of my ideas hadn't been shot down now, might have killed some time. Oh well. Then we took a break and came back and a group did Thriller as part of their performance, it was pretty great. And another great, lots of meaning squeezed out of it, performance ended our performance art section. So glad to be over with it, moving on to animation.

Stress-free for the rest of the day.

Well on the plus side when I told Sally about my zoom technique she said in her twenty years of photography she had never heard of it before.

how big is your wrap?

Thank god for low key days. I'm still tired and if I had to really work on breaking the artists mold today I might just end up breaking myself.

We critiqued our crosshatch Illustrator pieces in Digital Tools. Mine needed a little more contrast. Then we worked on compositions using squares and circles for the rest of class. Not really totally helpful but the more practice on Illustrator the better.

There was a note on the door for Drawing telling us that we were going to be meeting at the Portland Art Museum. There was a great Leonard Baskin show going on, really amazing woodcuts. I knew his work looked familiar, it all clicked when I saw the prints from his various collaborations that he did with Ted Hughes. "Oh yeah! I new his style was familiar, Crow."

We were instructed to draw three pieces in the museum so I drew in pen Leonard Baskin's "Self Portrait as a Priest" (actually I outlined the thick black lines he did, instead of filling them in. That would have killed my pen), a line art version of Milton Avery's "Portrait of Annette Kaufman" and I lightly sketched the face of the woman from Jean François de Troy's "Allegory of Music". I have never been keen on assignments that have to do with trying to recapture the beauty of already existing work, but I do love discovering more about the piece as I focus on the details as I try to recreate them.

Phil and I ran into Arvie at coat-check as we were preparing to leave for lunch. Arvie told us that instead we were going to his studio/to check out a gallery. I don't know if you can actually still hold class during the campus-wide lunch hour but he has such a strong, commanding voice and so I followed him with only minor complaints (I was really hungry).

The gallery/studio ended up being in the same building my comic shop is. The first floor was mostly gallery space and a few shops, and above that are 35 artist studios. I asked Arvie if he was working on a piece using sandwiches as a medium and he said no. The gallery showing was very conceptual and a little sloppy for my tastes , I think I might have enjoyed it had I not spent the past hour and a half gazing at "fine art".

Arvie's studio was pretty awesome, improved by the fact that he whipped out some jelly beans and potato chips to share with us. It was a really nice large space with good light and enough room for his paintings (which are quite massive and colorful). After the tour he dismissed us for the day, as he had taught through lunch and whatnot.

Mollie, Mel, Eva and I looked about in the comic shop. Mel bought a little self-printed minicomic. Nothing new had come in for me so we all left to get food. We hit up one of the parking lot vendors, I got a chicken Cesar salad wrap. It was good though a little pricey. My hunger wins over my common sense most of the time. Maybe I should have held out for Hot Lips instead. Oh well.

We went back to PNCA and then parted ways. I'm so glad I don't have any 6-9 classes, that is just brutal! Biked home and now I can take it easy(er). Read some Art History. Whoo.

yesterday is today

Thanks to the Some Cats From Japan show, I for the first time in my life started to nod off in class. 4 hours of sleep + Art History at 8am does not make a good combination. Thankfully the room was so cold that I didn't succeed in dozing off, if it was warm I would have been out.

Yesterday:

Nathan and Rubie's final hang out day with yours truly. I had bought tickets for us for the Cartune Xprez show, hosted by Hooliganship (the duo were wearing really adorable bright red and bright blue long john combinations). We got there right on time and ran into Suki (who was going to the same event) on the streetcar. We had to sit in the front row and then they told us that theatre 2 had opened and it was playing the same thing so we were free to go to it and get better seats. We sat down in the second row. Leia sat next to me (nerd names unite). About 15 minutes after it was supposed to start was when the first video started playing. It had no sound so they stopped and restarted it trying to get it to have sound, but it didn't work. Another 15 minutes went past and they started to play a video from another TBA event in the waiting time, something German with lots of long pauses. I went and grabbed a 7-up and a Violet Crumble to munch on and when I came back they were playing a Hooliganship dvd from last year. Pretty trippy stuff, including a really sad video about a fox and a snow angel. Eventually they came out and said the Cartune Xprez was unplayable (both our version and the other one). They promised a refund and an invitation for us to come see the show at a later date.

I got my refund at PICA and we decided to trek down to Chinatown and see whats what. Stopped in at Floating World Comics but there were no new issues in for me. Love that shop.

Compound Gallery was open and was having a DigMeOut show. Unlike some museums and typical galleries, they cram as much art into the space as possible. It doesn't draw from the art to have it all so close together, it just forces the viewer to look closer. And closer I did. Loved so much of the work going on, just like I did last summer for the DigMeOut 2006 show. There was new work by Cho-Chan up and I was blown away by seeing Kana Ohtsuki's pieces in person. Beautiful work, really inspiring. Chatted with the guy managing the gallery and headed out.

There was a festival of sorts happening on 4th, live music and food stalls. Had some lunch and split ways with Nate and Rubie because I had essays to write and reading to read.

Around sevenish Celia arrived in Portland and Nathan and Rubie returned to Goose Hollow. We all hung out and chatted. I bought some shoes from Rubie for 25 cents (superstition). They are really cute flats with bows and polka dots. She also gave me a fabulous necklace and matching earrings (have to pierce my other ear now).

Rubie and Nathan left to get food for the train ride and to head back to the hotel. Gave Rubie hugs and a punch to Nathan's gut. Celia napped while I finished up my essays.

Lindsay had to work on a horrible painting project so she couldn't make Some Cats From Japan. I changed into stripey socks, Rubie's shoes, skinny jeans, my Guess white square neck shirt and my diagonal zippered Tommy Hilfiger jacket (I got it last summer at a Goodwill in Portland). I looked good, all ready for intense TBA musical performance. Sean came over at 9:20 and at 9:30 Celia, Sean and I left in her Prius for the show. There are construction pockets all over downtown Portland, so I was worried about getting from Goose Hollow to the Broadway Bridge but we got to it pretty easy, and got free parking a block away from the Wonder Ballroom.

The concert was one half intense performance, the other half was more about how it was made than a performance. The first and last guy blew me away, the middle two sort were not really up my alley but made for an interesting experience.

Fuyuki Yamakawa started off the night with a bang, or a loud hum that made me flinch. I don't know how he did it but there was a microphone attached to the side of his nose so his breathing and smacking his head with his palm created thumps and trills. Then he removed his shirt; revealing a stethoscope attached to his chest. The stethoscope was hooked up to a machine on the right and there was some light bulbs hanging in a cluster. He turned on the machine and set the volume and his pulse reverberated through the whole venue. With each heartbeat the light bulbs surged on. He breathed in and out slowly, achieving some control over his heartbeat. It beat faster and faster, the lights creating marks in my vision and he slowed it down, the beats were dangerously far apart (in the pamphlet he is quoted "Sometimes it stops my heart for seconds"). The beat really drew me in. Then he picked up the guitar. He didn't play it so much as turn the sound way up and move it back and forth and tap the side of it, the vibration creating noise from the strings instead of just plucking it. He continued for a long time with the guitar and heartbeat and then he brought in throat singing and the nasal hum. By the end, I was drawn in so much. My eyes, my ears, my whole body became a part of the performance.

It was a hard act to follow, and Kanta Horio didn't follow it well. He generated a sort of sound from magnetising paperclips and amplifying the audio of them moving about. A nice respit, but certainly far from the intensity of the first performance. After that Aki Onda was also a sort of lul in the program. His work was composed of recorded sounds played together off of cassettes, so it was interesting how he would have had to collect all the sounds but overall it didn't work so well for me. I was still coming down from the first performance I guess. A good number of people had become fed up with the two middle performances (or as it was about to roll over past midnight and they had to get up for work/class the next day like me) and left before the epic finale that was Atsuhiro Ito.

Today:

Atsuhiro Ito came out with his long fluorescent light tube and fiddled with the set up. I wasn't sure if it was him, he seemed rather humble and when the review said that his instrument, the Optron, was a fluorescent tube hooked up with microphones inside I was expecting something a little more grand looking. Actually all of the performers were really subtle in appearance (save for Yamakawa's belly button length hair) and didn't try to dominate the stage, rather leaving their music to overrule us all. All of a sudden the lights went out and he started.

All the illumination came from the pulsing of his Optron, which flared and dimmed as he played it. I wish I knew how he was controlling the lights but he had a great sense for how to use his instrument. The microphones reacted with the speakers set up behind him and simultaneously he was switching on and off little dials with his feet. And this man was 42! I wonder how he managed to maintain himself for well over half an hour standing a foot away from speakers and holding a three foot tube of light. Another all consuming performance, something I doubt will be equalled any time soon. Well equalled in the sense of me seeing anything as awesome any time soon. I also got a picture with him after the show.

There was another band coming on after Some Cats From Japan. We stayed to watch them preform a couple songs but a unanimous decision came about that we were tired so at 1:10am we left to go back to Goose Hollow. Celia slept on an inflatable mattress in my living room and it felt great to sink into bed at about 1:50am. Hated HATED the alarm going off at 6:00am but what are you going to do? It was worth it.

I didn't want to bother with making lunch, figuring Yo's soup would hit whatever spot that needed hitting later on. I was a little wobbly on my bike but I got my energy and balance right as I turned onto 14th from Clay which was when I needed by balance and energy so it all worked out.

Art History was brutal. Our first real lecture class and it was slide after slide of the teacher talking about Paleolithic this and cave painting that. Not that it is boring but it was oh so not what I needed in the morning. Found myself nodding off, trying to fidget and stay focused. The break didn't come soon enough and after a mini nap and a Nutrigrain bar I gained some energy and momentum and didn't nod for the rest of the class (or day).

2D Design was darkroom, which was review for me but also sort of frustrating that a lot of my negatives were over exposed and my first photography teacher never told me that you had to leave prints in the wash for 5+ minutes so there was way more time spent waiting than I'd like. Got a couple good prints, but they aren't dark enough. I wish I had my negatives from my first photography class, I didn't get to print all that I wanted. I'll pick them up next time I come home. At least time in the darkroom goes fast. Before I knew it, it was time for...

Time Arts! Long talk about performance art and then we divided up into groups to work on our pieces. I'm not totally psyched about our piece and a lot of my ideas were shot down but I get the sort-of main role so it isn't so bad. It isn't as involved and choreographed as it could be.

Essentially one by one we look in a box and we each have a different reaction to whats int he box (confusion, sorrow, despair) and then I come out and am over joyed by whats in the box and its a photo of our teacher. Still room for some changes but I think it will stay pretty much the same (it wasn't my main idea but so far no one else had any other thoughts so we went with it).

Then we watched a video about a performance artist whose name I have forgotten but in the end there was a man that was made from a mold that had jello poured into it and the audience was invited to eat the jello-man. It was titled "The Last Immigrant".

Boy was I happy to finally ride home. 8:00am-6:00pm. I hope Monday will never be my long day ever again.

Wonderful seeing Rubie, Nathan and Celia. Hope more people come and visit and hope that you all understand that when you visit I will have to do homework. I'll try to get a jump on it, but you know me. I get it done in the end, it just takes me some time to get to doing it.

in short

I hope Nate and Rubie had fun.

The animation didn't go as planned.

Finished my essays with time to spare.

Time that was spent with Celia.

Some Cats from Japan was a cacophony of awesome.

Full days in review tomorrow night.