Black and Red all over.

Several weeks ago, I attended a car show and most of what I saw was pretty amazing--narrowing my shots was easy. I feel like I'm getting more and more discerning of what work I like to show and what I feel is good. I was lucky enough to have a muse of sorts nearby this weekend to give me a little shove to finally get back in the groove of doing what I do. I'm an artist, I love Brazil, men, Paris, London, and cigarettes. What else matters?

The photos below were taken with a Sony A300 DSLR with a custom lomography lens.

Music Alert #2

I've been listening to some off kilter stuff as of late. Its been keeping me in some kind of weird sexual-artistic-hopeful mood. I don't know what's up, but I thank the stars for Genius, Pandora, and odd friends. Enjoy.

Change.

Its interesting how quickly things can change. If you can't read between the lines of my last post, then you probably have no idea of what I'm talking about. Power to the intelligent. In the duration that has been the month since that time, I've gotten a new tattoo, taken pictures, joined the Jersey City Artist's Group, moved, and gotten a job. I'm not a teacher, but I'm a researcher for a newspaper. Its boring, but it pays.

Anyways, enough about personal scheiße. If you want a real gander, listen to this:

My newest piece is based on a wallpaper from artist, James Jean. The piece itself was commissioned by the Prada fashion house. I love his style of monochromatic schemes with feminine details splayed as focal points. The piece itself is enormous, 17x200 feet. See the image below.

This is the portion I chose for myself. I chose this part because I have a running theme of knights, birds, and overly dramatic dark imagery and wording--something I suppose I've come to be known for.

Here is the finished product.

The words that are above the design read, "Notre amour est le plus silencieux ombre du fort." Or, "Our love is made of the quietest shade of loud."

I feel a little rejuvenated now. Its good to be back.

Writing Exercise #3 and Music.

Writing Exercise 3: Define danger and its possible repercussions.

Listen to this and read.

I have been a taintable light since as long as I can remember. A fawn in the guise of a leader—a follower, through and through. I was set to be the prince of a vast empire of wealth and love and yet, the desire you awoke in me caused me to single handedly destroy the kingdom for which I thought I was destined to rule along side a gracious and magnanimous lord. You have stolen what is mine and replaced it again with the uncertainty that is life.

What have I done? I was lured by your voice, your actions, the contact. You released my desire and in turn….released the undoing of everything that was my stability. You are danger epitomized without even knowing.

Unknowing destroyer, fed by lies and sustained only by the guilded tales of a silken tongue, soaked and bathed in the fruits of inaccessible embarrassment and toil. Danger. Foiled. Uncomfortabilty and unrequited—I chase, I want, I follow…into peril and self induced anguish.

Rome has fallen and burned; time and time again. You are not the sole cause, but you were, no, are, the desire that behest my death and rebirth.

Danger, you breath it. Exude it. Embody it. I bow before it and accept the bed for which I have created. I am undone, as you are danger.

Behold, for I have brought much body art.

This was a terribly vain idea I had a while back. I told another fabulous artist friend of mine about it months ago. I decided to take pictures of my tattoos in sort of a grimy dark way. To achieve this, I used some petroleum jelly mixed just a tiny bit of black eye shadow. I also had help from someone near and dear, this was certainly a joint project. Here are the results:

In the meantime I'll keep on those promised storyboards.

Story Board Idea

The Duke of Dual Bewilderment


The idea of this story board came to me because its hard for me to just talk about the random ideas I have—especially those regarding music. When I listen to music my imagination goes into overload and I see elaborate stories and pictures unfolding and being created. So, I decided to undertake the project of showing you what can happen when I group a decent amount of music under one semi-cohesive idea.

To preface this, as if this were to be unfolding in front of you as a movie, it would be very much like Fantasia…pictures moving with music. Although instead of each piece of music and pictures having a separate idea, this will be streamlined.

The overall plot/idea was, and I quote from an email I sent a fellow artist, “I want to do a story board for one of my playlists, the Kingdom Story playlist specifically. It'll be about the double life of some duke who is a part time bureaucratic/aristocratic foolhardy mess and a part time crazy who lives a secret life of go-go dancing and incognito excursions into interesting parts of a city I haven't chosen yet.” I obviously needed to refine this a bit.

Here goes…In the present times, a 20-something man has just found out he’s the Duke of Essex in some undisclosed city. The man is whisked from what he has known and thrown into a head of state role for which he has no training whatsoever. For the first couple weeks he finds himself walking around his new estate, finding the constraints of being a figure head terrible boring and lonely.
The Duke decides to ride his horse out of the city to the outlying fields alone. There, while frustrated and reading he hears someone laughing at him. A masked man, (think gilded mask) approached the Duke. They exchange words, even flirt, and decide that perhaps they will meet again.
After meeting someone who is fairly normal the Duke cannot begin to concentrate on the reality of being a dignitary. He tosses and turns in bed and decides to leave the his estate and go into the city as the Duke of Addison, a deceased person from hundreds of years ago, who apparently had an affinity to live on the more interesting side of things. The Duke of Essex makes this transformation by wearing common clothing paired with regalia of his state nature. The focus of transformation will be around his eyes. The usually nude eye will suddenly be glazed and golden, circa Iggy Pop but more of a Sailor Moon sort of thing, but less sugary.
While roaming the city the Duke runs into masky again. Although donning the new persona of Addison, this is a bit awkward and Addison/Essex withdraws from the conversation—at which point masky asks if they’ve met and eventually to come to a ball, Addison simply turns the corner and gets into a black cab. Inside he changes back into Essex and roams the streets looking for masky, but he is nowhere to be found.
On the way back to his estate Essex decides he needs to make Addison more of a character in the scheme of outside life. The transformation is much more elaborate this time. Addison is now found at a bar dancing caged as an armored cowboy and engaging in various debaucherous events.
After a day of crazy Essex returns to find the Lord Suffolk waiting, who then extends an invitation to a ball. Essex thinks something is familiar about the man.
The day of the ball arrives, the first half consists of Essex talking and dancing with Suffolk. As the musicians take a break and the lights return, the guests clap, Essex slips out and transforms into Addison. To his surprise masky is waiting for him. They dance and talk. The lights go out and Addison is gone, leaving masky once again.
The next day the Lord of Suffolk returns to Essex’s estate. They meet and while tea is being served he sits the a familiar mask on the table.


Fin

As contrived and weird as it is, this is what my story board will be about. Now I’m off to start drawing this out.

Welcome to my version of "Apartment Therapy".

Its been a long while since I've written. A lot has been going on. I just finished student teaching and finally got my home together. There is also a new addition to my family--she's a ten week old pug named Maleficent, or Millie for short. Any way here are the results of my home:

Let me know what you think. I'll be back soon, I have some music I'm dying to talk about.