michael jackson

michael jackson sadly passed away yesterday. i feel sorry for this, but earlier today my sister brought to my attention a terrifying possibility: that he will rise again. it is only a matter of time until the third midnight, when he will resurrect through some unholy incantation and as the undead master summon from the bones of those long dead an army of darkness bent on the corruption of all things living. a series of text messages my sister sent explains further:

Luke (2:24 pm): michael jackson died.

Lindsay-poo (2:29 pm): i know. it's bad but i sleep a little easier knowing he won't pop out of the bushes next to me. ... but then, wouldn't zombie michael jackson look EXACTLY THE SAME??

Lindsay-poo (2:34 pm): someone has to think of these things, though. steps must be taken to prevent his undead awakening.

Lindsay-poo (2:44 pm): this could be the start of the zombie apocalypse. we should have seen it coming when jackson started turning pale and inhuman.

i don't think the world is aware of the danger we are facing. the third midnight is saturday june 27th - if sunday morning you wake up and the world is still at peace, then heave the heavy sigh of relief shared by all who wake to realize that humanity has not yet succumbed to the bleeding claws of an apocalyptic scourge of undead minions.

breath, thou invisible poem: part 2

after lil and i finished the previously mentioned photo series, i was pretty dead set on figuring out how i could use the photos for one of my design classes. i pulled out my four favorite frames and came up with this:


notice how the four frames loosely depict her from head to toe, making a kind of mashup portrait. also, i like how the light and dark divided by the horizon in the second frame are consistent throughout the other frames, further unifying them in this way. this is a favorite.

as for the last frame, you may notice something interesting about what she's sitting on. here's another look at it:

anyway, fun stuff. see if you can figure out what's going on here. the only post-production i did here was a little contrast adjustment and removing the color. whatcha think?

breath, thou invisible poem

the epic day has arrived: lillian and i did a collaborative project based off of a poem with no name by a german poet, Rainer Maria Rilke, and the time has come to post it. the first line is:

Atmen, du unsichtbares Gedicht!

or:

Breath, thou invisible poem!

and thus i have informally titled the project as the line above, because I will never remember how to spell unsichtbares. the project consists of a series of ten b&w photographs, each one depicting a model with a line from the poem written on their skin. the location of the text and the context of the photographs are meant to give lillian's specific interpretation of the poem. her artistic vision was awesome, as well as her compositional skills: rock on, cleopatra.

to dig into the series a little bit, find the english translation of each line of the poem in each picture below, and consider its physical location and context as well as any present symbols.
they all tie into a common theme of nature, motherhood, and sexuality. here's the series below - keep in mind that as thumbnails, they've lost a lot of their contrast and crispness:

(firefox didn't like the iframe tag i used here - if no pictures show up, pls comment & let me know!)

here is the original poem followed by lil's interpretation (she would say it's a loose one):

Atmen, du unsichtbares Gedicht!
Immerfort um das eigne
Sein rein eingetaustcher Weltraum. Gegengewicht,
in dem ich mich rythmisch ereigne.

Einzige Welle, deren
allmaehliches Meer ich bin;
sparsamstes du von allen moeglichen Meeren, --
Raumgewinn.

Wieviel von diesen Stellen der Raeume waren schon
innen in mir. Manche Winde
sind wie mein Sohn.

Erkennst du mich, Luft, du, voll noch einst meiniger Orte?
Du, einmal glatte Rinde,
Rundung und Blatt meiner Worte

or:

Breath, thou invisible poem!
Evermore encircling self in
His pure traded world-space. Counterpoise,
in which I come to rhythmic realization.

Lone wave, whose
Gradual ocean I am;
Sparing thee from all possible oceans, --
Space regained.

How many of these realms of space were already
inside me. Some winds
are as my son.

Dost thou know me, Air, thou, full with what were hitherto
my places? Thou, once smooth rind
Swell and wave of my words.

---

so there you go. i shot this with a Canon Rebel XT and a 50mm 1.8 "Thrifty Fifty" lens. the text was written with a black fine-tip prismacolor sketch marker (good for skin!). we shot at a farm, a pond up the canyon, and in my kitchen, all in provo, utah. wham-o. seeya next time, folks.

triptych

i threw this together last week for my 2d portfolio. the picture is a photo i took in the louvre in paris, and was lucky enough to get these four random people's super interesting expressions. i split it down the center, offset it, and played with merging them in photoshop. i don't think that the photo has found its true calling yet, tho. shmrrrf.

frisco hills 3

here's the last installment in the 'frisco hills series' - numéro 3. it seems like most of my favorite art is made when i'm half asleep or really sick, and this is no exception. there's some level of creativity that is more easily attained when in such semiconscious states. often, i get my best ideas when i am just waking up in the morning, or half out of a powernap in the afternoon. is it because our minds are so engaged in the present, utilizing senses and analyzing surroundings, that we are normally unable to attain to this state of consciousness? if one were to give time to attain to it on a regular basis, wouldn't ideas be much more abundant, and in the end, quality of life improved? is drug use an artificial means of attaining to some corrupted version of this state, and that's why you get a lot of cracked-out artists? why is detachment from present physical reality often a requirement for deeper levels of creativity?

anyway, frisco hills 3 was made from a picture i took while driving near the golden gate bridge. as i obviously had other priorities besides getting a decent picture, the photo turned out pretty horrible:

so i took it into photoshop, leveled the horizon, upped the contrast, black and whited it, tinted it a special yellow, put on a cutout filter, made some other adjustments, and put in a pterodactyl. don't ask why. remember, i made this when in a stupefied daze.

the frisco hills series was an experiment on taking pictures i really hated and making them into something i loved. these are it. i might add to them later. the end.

the nightmare of tenebrism

Still Life with Quince, Cabbage, Melon, and Cucumber, circa 1600, by Juan Sánchez Cotán. Oil on canvas. San Diego Museum of Art.

baroque art has always rubbed me the wrong way. one reason is that i'm not the biggest fan of realism. mostly prevalent in baroque still lifes, it seems like a whole level of interpretation is lost when something is painted or drawn to realistic standards - how much different is it than a photograph, besides being a demonstration of artistic skill? although realist painters have my utmost respect as masters of their medium, artists who are too literal forget that it's not what you say, it's how you say it. style is essential to the message and personality an artwork conveys. too often, realism is sterile.

however, the biggest reason baroque art has freaked me out since day 1 is this: tenebrism. "les ténèbres" in french means "darkness". it is a technique that appears to be omnipresent in baroque art - a weird black void that seems to be in the back of every composition, waiting for you to turn away so it can suck the entire piece into nonexistence. i'm not talking about a nice solid black to balance out an otherwise high-key composition here. i'm talking 2001: A Space Odyssey when stanley kubrick strikes the chord of fear deep in your heart by so masterfully depicting the void of space and having evil robot-mind hal send astronaut frank poole struggling, asphyxiating, hurtling into the vaccum.

i've recently mentally catalogued most of the nightmares i've remembered throughout my life, and the vast majority of them have had this same weird darkness that is caused by no visible light source. naturally, there is a good measure of lighting in the center of things, but it seems like any distance in these nightmares just fades off into empty blackness. statues coming to life, skeletons beckoning me into weird rooms with filthy shag carpet, and most everything I dream about that causes fear is tenuously suspended in the same weird black void that baroque art so proudly utilizes. for me, a gallery of such pieces becomes a silent collection of nightmares, the only safeguard from which is my consciousness and detachment from its content.
all things aside, it's not that i'm a total baroque-a-phobic, but i think that most people would acknowledge as i do the eerieness of this style of art. perhaps a somewhat lacking, but possibly effective way of recreating this feeling is to do a google image search on "baroque art", and especially still lifes. to do so is to discover a common palette of Darkness.

AGOSTINO CARRACCI Italian, 1557-1602 Madonna and Child with St. John Oil on canvas, 38 x 31 1/2"

frisco hills 2

today's delicious treat is the second installment of the "frisco hills" series, thus entitled 'frisco hills 2'. again, i took it while driving on the freeway, and again it was a mediocre photograph i tried to salvage. what remains here is a very small part of the original photograph. the freeway is actually right below these hills. i think i appreciate this picture the most for its ability to convey the feeling of a stormy spring day. contributing to this is the sponge filter i placed over the picture. i think i'd like it better if the subtle earthy-orange touch on some of the trees was a little more apparent.

i'm having trouble reconciling tight schedules and creativity. it seems like the two are incompatible - you either assume a mechanical mind stacked with schedules and priorities to even be able to handle all you've taken on, or you give yourself time to meditate and feel and create and grow. now that summer is coming to an end, i fear that the latter is giving way to the former. last year, i was extremely busy. i was almost inhuman, running to catch up from morning to midnight just to get my homework done and make enough money to pay the bills. this summer, i've had time to write, hike, photograph, create, and meditate, but i am definitely ready to be a little busier. naturally, the ideal is the balance between these two situations.
however, i don't have a choice how much homework i'm assigned or how hard i need to work to get enough photo gigs to pay rent. although i have strength and will to act in my own sphere, life is full of factors that are out of my control.

for me, creating art is a way of life. i see and feel and experience things every day, seek inspiration from various (often random) sources, and through meditation, conversation, and creation somehow create an environment where a few elements of inspiration, creativity, and experience will converge all at once and it will all just click, and bam - the art almost creates itself. it's like living life in the same way that one sometimes starts drawing without having any preconception of what they want to draw. create the right environment, and things happen.

the problem with extreme business is that i am constantly running. i don't look at the sky or the weird laundromat down the street or the facial expressions of people that walk by. i don't think about what i want to be or express or how i'll do it. i become a machine, because there is no room for imperfection. life is planned by the minute, my social life takes the backburner, and creativity becomes a hobby instead of a way of being.

obviously then, i must sacrifice something. it doesn't seem like i can afford to, though. is it possible for one to be a machine and force steamlike puffs of artistic passion to pump out at regular intervals, all with head down and mind stacked with priorities and schedules? it all sounds like andy warhol's campbell's soup cans - screen printed and mass produced, lacking emotion.

there must be a way to reconcile it all. it starts tuesday.