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.