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Blood: The Last Vampire

Just as an fyi, this clip has blood & violence, albeit animated. Just in case that squiks you at all.

This is from-- i guess it's an OVA; it's shorter than a movie-- Blood: The Last Vampire. The title pretty much gives away the "surprise" at the very end, but i really kind of sort of don't care. I missed the very beginning, but this is one hell of a thing: there's moments where you go, "That is so fucked up; Japan what is wrong with you?" but at the same time, you're completely engrossed in what's going on. The animation is amazing (it was made in 2000, i think?), it moves along at a quick, crazy pace, & there isn't a shit voice actor in the entire thing, which is surprising, to be honest.

Actually, one other thing i really like is that this is default bilingual. When i walked into the room, i heard English. Okay, i figured, maybe Netflix streaming instant stuff doesn't allow for the option to change audio tracks. Oh well. The voice actors seemed pretty okay anyways. Then, a scene change, & all of a sudden, there's Japanese & subtitles! It was confusing for a split second, but since the movie takes place mostly at an American military base in Japan (just before the Vietnam War breaks out), it makes sense. So Saya, the main character, speaks both English & Japanese.

This video is probably my favorite part of the OVA (is it an OVA i am confused). I like dramatic things (i grew up on old school anime & the like; what do you want of me), for one thing. This doesn't quite show the really fucked up parts (awkward to be watching with your dad, kind of?), though if you're adverse to spurts of blood, it's already fucked up enough. (But, er, a short phrase to illustrate: body used to keep doors closed. You can barely see it in this, but it's there.) But it does show the crazy amazing animation, & the shockingly good voice acting.

And i appreciate the fact that Saya is a total badass, & the fact that there isn't one idiotic underwear shot in the entire thing. When she gets the school uniform she's wearing, she actually plucks at the bow & goes, "What the hell is this?" in a total deadpan voice. It's like, hah, take that, hentai: not going to be playing into your little fantasies today.

Lalala stuff. I went to some small galleries in Washington DC this past Saturday; they were all in these awesome old homes.

Saw a lot of really awesome stuff, though something happened right at the end of the trip that kind of ruined my mood. Trying to get back into the feeling of, "awesome, now i wanna make stuff" is really difficult.

For Painting class this semester, we're supposed to have a kind of theme, i guess, to work with. My original idea was something like "identity," but i don't even know what i'm really doing anymore. These are just the first two.

This is the painting that this is all about.

This is just random from going places.


I have no idea what this one is doing. The teacher expects it to be more "finished"-- her idea of "finished", i guess, because i feel like it could be finished...?

Also, stained glass this semester! It's very laborious.

But the first window came out pretty well:


Etc., etc. Crazy.

this is bothering me.

Today in Painting III, we had critique the entire class. I went last. The mood was generally pretty good all through the crit-- surprisingly good, maybe, considering how crits usually feel (anyone who's sat through a critique knows what i mean). The teacher had brought in coffee & donut holes; i suggested this was her way of trying to get us to talk in the crit, & someone named Margaret i talk to sometimes said she talks a lot when she has caffeine & was generally being pretty funny ("These brushstrokes just speak to me! Such poetry!" in an exaggerated way). And really, all through the crit, that seemed to be the general mood. People were talking & laughing & it was actually pretty nice.

But my critique is bothering me. I had three canvases up; one apparently the teacher wants to see more finished, one i've just started. The problem i have is with the first one.

This is all going to sound ridiculous, but i feel uncomfortable with how people are perceiving it. Like, genuinely uncomfortable, & it keeps sitting on my mind. (Maybe it's the fact that i've basically had three cups of coffee today, but i don't think so.) People are perceiving it as being humorous, as, i think, poking fun.

I'm sure anybody reading this just went, "Okay, why the fuck is this such a big deal; jfc."

Part of me finds it somewhat interesting. Like how people misread what she's holding & what's in her mouth. I genuinely don't understand where people are getting the humor from, even though i myself have a sort of ambivalence towards the subject matter. But i feel like... i don't know, i didn't mean this to be funny, & this is kind of worrying me. If i paint someone dressed in a geeky sort of way, will people then assume that i'm lampooning geeks? I didn't mean to paint this in a way that reads as "funny" to people; i wanted people to draw their own conclusions, yes, but i also wanted people to see a person. Which maybe seems at odds with my usual views towards society & people, seeing as i'm so cynical & crap; you'd think that i'd be like, "Yeah, funny! Make fun of this person! Yeaaah $7.99!" I mean, the $7.99 was a mere starting point because i had no clue what to paint. But really, i can't quite put my finger on it, but this kind of reaction unsettles me.

I think i might be able to explain it when i mention that my teacher says she sees humor in my sketchbook. I have never seen myself as a humorous person; i have never seen my sketchbook as humorous. I put in some things that are funny-- things that happen, things people say-- but overall, it's kind of a catch-all, & more & more i find myself putting in things that are the total opposite of "funny" or "humorous," even if it's not obvious. And other times, i just put things in, without any ulterior motive.

Just, listening to everyone saying, "Oh, this is humorous. You have a certain kind of humor. Maybe that's part of your artistic lexicon, even if you don't feel it's 'you,'" made me feel uncomfortable. And maybe, maybe it's because i feel like, here i am, once again unable to articulate myself. I don't want to make humorous work. It sounds bad, somehow, putting it like that, but i really don't. And i always feel like i can't express myself-- can't even do it now-- & so, to kind of get this major sort of misread (i feel like that) on something that i'm "supposed" to be "good" at by now is just demoralizing. It's like, Great, once again, i've fucked up & people aren't picking up what i'm putting down. People just sort of go, "Oh, she's funny; look at her trying to be standoffish; what a funny picture." Maybe i expect too much of viewers, but i was hoping for a wider read of it. Of, yeah, maybe she's funny, pathetic even.... but aren't you, ever? Can you seriously laugh at her? How do you know you're reading her right, in her clothes, her stance, the $7.99 floating over her head? You guys thought she was smoking when she wasn't. How do you know you're not seriously misreading this? Can't you step back & think a little more on it?

I also feel almost affronted to have my sketchbook mentioned as humorous. It sounds stupid & i know it, but it's really, just... I feel like it's a misread plus an assumption. It's like assuming that everything i have in there has some sort of spin on it, when really, a lot of the time i think that most of the stuff in there is really genuine, more so than anything i may make out of the book. I don't want someone looking at the "replaceable" page, for example, & thinking that there's some humor in there because of how i made it. There isn't. There's, i don't know, irony, maybe, in the stickers & bright colors, but i would feel really upset if i was misread that badly. Because of the emotion in it. I feel like "emotional" might sum up at least my sketchbooks, & i feel upset by the idea that people are reading it as "humorous." Because really, i find so little humorous.

And it all just makes me feel like now i have to do things in a certain way in order to get my point across. It's like in the rest of my life: what do i have to do to get people to fucking realize how i feel? How am i supposed to get points across to people, that i'm not trying to be funny, that i don't want to be? How am i supposed to be able to paint certain subject matter without people instantly assuming that there is humor there, that i'm lampooning someone or a certain group of people? Can't you have a bit of lampooning but try to get the viewer to see that, hm, this is another human being? Instead of just, "hey, humorous!" & seeming to leave it at that, not read further into it?

Seriously. Nothing i ever say or do seems to get across to people. Not verbally, not through writing, not visually. I never seem to be able to articulate myself well enough; i'm always taken the wrong way, words are always put into my mouth. I'm just tired of it.

Well, this is how i feel & i'm tired of people belittling my feelings

Biceps, triceps, and even Abdi

This is a painting of a plastic trash bag, but look at it. You cannot tell me that it is not amazing. This is seriously probably the most inspiring thing i've seen lately.

I didn't watch "Work of Art," because i don't really do TV, nor do i do "reality" shows, or whatever you want to call those shows where people compete & get voted off. But i was already acquainted with Abdi Farah's name. He's an alumn of my high school (ye olde Carver, or as they like to call it now, GeorgeWashingtonCarverCenterforArtsandTechnology), & he was already good back then. He was the primary student that the teachers would bring up when they talked about people who had graduated whose work was amazing. I guess they were trying to get us to be inspired, to want to push ourselves to be as amazing, but more often than not, for someone like me, it kind of makes me want to say, "Oh what the hell i give up; i'm no good at this shit anyways."

I really wasn't surprised when i heard that Abdi had won. I dunno, i just kind of expected it to happen. His solo show at the Brooklyn Museum of Art opened this past Friday, & Mrs. McDaniel Shovlin (she remarried & i will never get used to the new surname) went up there with Mr. Cypressi, so the photo of the painting is from her Facebook. To be honest, at first i didn't really care much about any of this-- i mean, Abdi is a genuinely nice guy (it's not just an act; the few times i've spoken to him he;s been so crazy nice & he doesn't even know me; he has no reason to be nice to me or anything), & he deserves to be recognized for his crazy amazing work, but i was just kind of feeling disconnected from it, i guess. (My mood, lately, perhaps.) But now, i don't know, it's like... yeah, i guess i would like to see his show. I mean, seriously, i know Abdi's work is amazing. I've seen it before (see last year's Alumni Show hanging & the "oh shit you have a huge freaking gun in that we can't hang it"-"can i name it the hope gun?"-"grab a sharpie & draw a heart on it?"). But that freaking trash bag-- i can't even. I mean. Look at it. For once, seeing something like this makes me want to make something, as opposed to feeling like saying "why should i even bother?"

Once in class-- i was a senior stuck with juniors in Painting III, because i hadn't taken it when i was a junior-- we were to go out & paint landscapes. The annoying transfer from BSA said something about how boring the grounds were or something. Mrs. Shovlin (then still McDaniel) looked at him. "That's the job of an artist," she said. "To take the ordinary and make it extraordinary."

I guess this is what she meant.

Some old pictures:



Drew this in the morning after having been up all night. It's on a small piece of flimsy cardboard & i have two more left, so i'm going to do other faces on them. I didn't have anything like Jem in front of me-- no, the inspiration was the tail end of the "Alien From L.A." episode of Mystery Science Theater 3000.


Also, last week was Shark Week! I forget what i was watching, & a point on the map said "Great White Cafe." I guess that's a place where a lot of great white sharks congregate? But i thought first of a cafe for sharks (where no dishes are ever done because the tiger sharks willingly eat them), & then of a shark-themed cafe for humans. So these are the good pictures, as opposed to the crappy webcam one.


I have no idea which is closest to the actual colors, so...

And this is last night. Sitting in the car, reading The Two Towers, & i liked the light.

And looook at this crazy amazing music video:

"It was (directed) handmade by IRINA DAKEVA @ WIZZ. It is composed of approx 2000 images watercolor painted one after another."

Great White Cafe

Bad webcam picture for right now. It's watercolor & ink on a piece of wood, so it would never stand up to the elements, ever. It'd probably melt off.

Aw.

I ought to pay attention to this blog again, like i said i was going to do. Especially since the last time i posted here was while i was still in California, & that just kind of depresses me.

It's funny, because yesterday i was really jut sitting around, when i started thinking about all the things i did in CA, & with so many friends, & the absence of that was... I don't even know how to describe it.

Just spent ages trying to recapture a hamster. It was definitely an Event; Kat has battle scars.

A while ago, i did the first two pages in the sketchbook for The Sketchbook Project:







This is completely unrelated:

Later, will have to take pictures of the pages drawn while flying to California. Nice weather here, while back in Baltimore it was, what 91 degrees yesterday & it felt like 98? But here it was 74 or 75. So niiiiice.

finally!

got my sketchbook for the Sketchbook Project in the mail today, & it comes with a library card for the Brooklyn Art Library, where the sketchbook’s going to live once i send it back. The library card even has “2011 Participating Artist” on it!

no pressure. :\

Goldie