I Don't Care What They Say About You, I Love You

It wasn't my intention to have my next entry be about another performance artist.  I was supposed to post pictures, lists and thoughts.  Yet, as I lay in bed, drinking tea, warming myself up and optimistically thinking that I am feeling better from my cold I found myself clicking on a link that said "Ummmmmmmmm No" with a video of a woman sitting knitting with no pants on knitting.

That woman is Casey Jenkins, an Australian performance artist and "craftavist" who has been performing a piece entitled "Casting off my Womb" by sitting in a gallery for 28 days as she knits from yarn that she has placed in her vagina.

Maybe I should also say that some people may be offended by this piece. It contents are of a "graphic nature" with subject material that may make people feel uncomfortable.  I didn't really want to say that but I did.

Here is a video where she eloquently talks about her piece with great clarity, sensitivity, and intimacy.

For me, this is a great piece of art because it makes me feel something.  There is a sensation in my heart that I can not quite describe right now. A tightness in my throat and chest.  And maybe a bit of arousal.  Not that this piece makes me want to masturbate or have sex, I am nowhere near the realm of that kinky at all, in fact, rather far from it,  but rather it creates a bit of intimacy between myself and my own vagina.  Maybe it was because as she reached out for the string to gently pull to create another casting, I found that gesture to be beautiful and gentle.  Maybe it was because I found her voice to be soothing and comfortable.  Maybe because a vulnerability in me related to her sitting there, pants off, on display, in a room where at the moment she is by herself.  Maybe because she creates a relation between this piece and her womb, a relationship with her vagina as it is, with herself as she is, before she possibly creates a child or maybe because she doesn't.  I don't know what her story will be and I don't fully know why I feel the way I do.  I do hope that you won't judge me for it though.  For we never really do know what is going on in anothers life, what has gone on, when we place judgement on them.  Normally, those judgements are far from the truth and just a way to label something that we don't understand, or relate to the un-relatable.

 Maybe I relate to it on a emotional and sexual level because I am confronting my own fertility, preparing for the future.  For my infertility.  I have begun doing research and making steps to freeze my eggs and it brings up a lot of emotions.  This time though I want to focus mostly on this piece.  I went a bit all over the place yesterday and there are many aspects of "Casting off my Womb" that deserve attention.  Not only because it's beautiful but also because of the reaction that it is getting from people on the internet.  A reaction that although doesn't shock me, I still find to be deeply saddening.

 I have seen this piece with introductions as "Oh my gosh this is SO GROSS," "Everyday This Woman Shoves a Ball of Yarn Up Her Vagina and Then Knits with it," and  "WTF VIDEO OF THE WEEK." First of all, I doubt that she "Shoves" the ball of yarn up her vagina.  I imagine that she places it there.  Secondly, these and comments such as "When will the rectal one be,"  "The things people do to get attention,"  " she is a nasty bitch. And not in the positive "nasty" way and not in the kinky "bitch" way,"  "this women is as sick as fuck......This women will have nothing to look forward to but loneliness at the end of a long selfish experiment of self awareness & lets not kid around, this nastiness was brought to you by Feminism,"  "She could of waxed her vagina ," further orchestrate a vagina fear that is still permeated in our society and also show a detachment that our society often had over our bodies and the bodies of others. Let me also say that these  comments were written by both women and men.  To call it immaturity would be correct yet to easy. In all reality, some people think its gross and don't know how to have a conversation about it so it is much easier to throw targets, call names, make fun of and question the sanity of Casey Jenkins It is much more complex than that, yet I have tried to touch the surface of it. Even though someone with a degree in feminism or something of that sorts would have a much better grasp on why this piece of art has created such strong reactions.  It appears that it is very challenging for a woman to create a sexual piece without it being completely sexualized.  What I mean is that once the subject uses her own body in the art piece, to be more specific, her vagina, people begin to treat her as a piece of meat and as a crazy person. If a woman does something that involves her vagina it must be sexual.   I can not help but remember how in the past women who masturbated were perceived to be insane and were as a result institutionalized.

What I believe to be the original site that posted the video, SBS2 Australia on YouTube,  has disabled all comments.  Which is a relief and also disheartening. While one can watch and enjoy, or in the case of many, be disgusted, one need not be distracted from whatever is coming from the peanut gallery.  Although, however sad those comments may be, they are also important, because they are a mirror of our society, and a reminder that there is still more progress to be made.

Do you like or dislike this piece?  If so why?  Does it confront any of your own ideas? Is there any art out there that is viewed as controversial that has caught your attention?

I hope you have a nice day, are kind to someone else and have someone be kind to you.

7 Needles & Jillian Mayer

Two cool things happened today.
               
             1. I got this awesome acupuncture treatment that rocked my body in some pretty radical ways.  I could feel the energy move, disappear, relocate, transition into various intensities, manifest with various sensations, and then go away.  I had waves of energy moving through my body from head to toe.  My throat tightened.  I coughed.  The heals of my feet began to hurt as if a lot of weight was resting on them.  I could feel energy moving in my ear canal.  Different parts of my head began to hurt.  My eyes fell shut upon themselves my body relaxing and then abruptly they reopened, wanting to stay open they focused on the halos forming around the light fixtures in the ceiling.  I don't think I blinked for a while.  I felt circular energy forming around each needle in my body. Three in my belly, two on my belly and two on my feet.  She asked me to come back in a couple of days and wear a tank top.  She was going to do my back. Before my session started,  she told me that my session could possibly be pretty intense.  We exchanged words that I can't remember, me trying to understand her.  Then I said "like the energy that gets moved when reiki is being performed on the body." "Yes!" she said.  When it was over.  I told her that it was freaking radical, bizarre, and wild and that I was totally into it.  I could see her smile and nod.



I am sure more than two cool things happened today.  It's just that right when these happened I felt my world being rocked.  May be a bit dramatic.  However, those are the words I chose.

              2. I discovered Jillian Mayer.

This was my first introduction

Ok, now I look at the hits on this video and it appears that over 2,000,000 people have watched it. Whatever! I don't care! I saw it for the first time and was excited to see a young women doing something strange that I am pretty sure would knock all my freak friends into total freak love.

I have for some time been a creator of scary art.  A teacher once took his students to one of my shows, it was a commentary on sanity and insanity in society.  I asked him what they had thought, he told me, "They asked if you were insane." Now I don't think Jillian Mayer is insane. Heck, I don't even know the gal.  But what I do know is that she produces odd, strange, sometimes scary, avant grade, bizarre videos that sometimes have a pop song to them.

I love a woman that is willing to put a bunch of crap on her face.  I mean most of us do on a regular basis.
Inner Voice: "Chrystal, that is using your judgment mind and is rather untrue and not very kind."
Oh well I am commenting on a video by an artist that commentates on society so opinions and loose language are running a bit free in my world.  Moreover, I love that she is a face drawer! I mean she really is! And so am I!  Many of my projects have involved face painting, body painting, and not in the whimsical oh I am a Faerie connected with nature kind of way, instead, the I am not afraid to make a statement kind of way.  One that makes me uncomfortable and could make you too. Though I promise, I am not doing it on purpose.  I really appreciate how this video is done in her living room to further imulate  tutorials on youtube and how she continues to reference a way of integration and repulsion from the technological world.

  "Scenic Jogging" created some fear in me and I love that.  I love when art makes me feel something.  An inanimate object is creating emotions that validate that I am freaking alive, and not in some cellphone, tv, alcohol, drug, sex, shopping, or food induced coma.  Go Fear! You really rocked it this time!

  When I watched an interview of her she talks about how in this video she plays a character that is is running after the unattainable.  I am reminded of reading an article of how westerners will not ever be happy because they can not enjoy their current state of attainment.  Meaning that they have a dream, they work very hard to reach it, they achieve the dream, and the amount of time that they spend enjoying that state of being is much smaller than easterners.  Instead, Westerners move onto, creating a wonder of what it is that they can achieve next.  There for there is a long period of dissatisfaction in our lives.

Speaking of which, I bet you didn't know you needed a new coffee mug?

On a very quite sidetrack to something that is a bit off track but I felled compelled to write it out anyways.  Well here it goes,. After getting home from my acupuncture appointment,  I had one memory from my past repeat in my head.  It was when one of my best friends and I finally connected for the very first time.  We didn't really know each other and had been doing the whole, "We should hang out some time," for about nine months.  Then one night on the steps outside of the art building we had a discussion on energy.  How everything was energy.  How we could feel the space between people as energy.  How we felt energy in our body. How the stones that we were standing on were even energy.  It was one of those moments, where you look over at a person and realize that you have understood something beyond words.  Something that goes down to the core.

Well I could go on more, and so more properly and with better grammar and stuff with a more reserved way of showing some new found loves, but obviously I didn't feel like it so I gut all pumped up and now I got to stop because I need to slow down the blood pumping system and call it a night.  Seriously, my heart is beating pretty hard to me.

Is there something that has rocked your world? Is there another artist out there that almost the majority of the internet knows besides myself that you could open my art loving eyes to? Anything got you all excited that you didn't care and threw standards of how to be out the window? I'd love to hear about it. Or hey, how about you invisible data searching machines, no not you if your a real person, I am talking about the websites that traffic my sight that I am pretty sure are not real people, think about how technology affects your relation to mankind.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GQz4k2_wseo

Dream ON!

I just reread my post and I am kind of embarrassed how I talk about myself a lot while referencing her work.  I guess I just got excited about "getting to know" someone over the internet that reminded me of myself in some ways.  A kindred art spirit on another plain.  Oh, how stuff comes out of my head when I don't refine or restrain it...

A Drawing For Today

           Sometimes in life, we pick things up and then we drop them.  Sometimes it's a bowl of cereal, a crush, a style, a diet, a job or a hobby.  For a big part of my life I drew.  I would draw for hours, forgetting about time, the world around me, my problems.  Fully pulled into whatever marks I was placing on the paper.

            I haven't finished a drawing for a while.  During my drawing drought,  I have done some scribbles, doodled while talking on the phone, started something, didn't like it, then either quickly turned the page to either stare at it and close it or make a couple marks and then move onto something else.  I couldn't find a drawing inside of me.  There was nothing to pull out. The whole process was extremely uncomfortable. 

            Several years ago, I went through a writers block.  It happened sometime after my mother passed away.  I didn't write anything for several years.  Not a page in a journal, not a postcard, not a holiday note, or a wish for a Birthday.  I finally wrote a birthday card.  The process was painful.  My handwriting was shaky and my writing seemed forced and extremely unnatural. I would even go so far as to call it painful.  1 year later,  I was filling up a notebook a month with thoughts, desires, dreams, nightmares, obsessions and memories.

            Well, on November 11, 2013,  I finished a drawing! In fact I did two, but the first one I consider more to be my warm up.  For the sake of it though, we can go ahead and say I finished two.  To my astonishment, the process wasn't painful, wasn't forced, nor was my mind  filled with thoughts of judgement.  I simply went along,  made some marks and continued till I said that it was done. I accepted it for what it was.  Not passing judgement was a relief I wasn't even mindful of at the time.

             Someone famous once said something along the lines of "If you don't know what to draw, just draw lines. If you still don't know what to draw, draw more lines" that is of course loosely quoted since I can't even remember who said it. Draw On!

All is Beautiful...

                                                                    Right now

 What is here in this moment

 Is beautiful

 No one can say otherwise 

 No one owns this moment

It is already gone

 But while we still have each other

 We shall dance to a tune for the things that we love

The sun shines

Our bodies are  filled with breath

 We are lucky to have each other

We are gifted

We are love

Take Me To The Ocean

          I am hesitant to write this.  It seems that there are a countless other amount of posts that chronologically fit before this one.  Many stories and photos that lead up to this very moment.  I want it to make sense.  For there to be some order.  Somewhere.  Yet, lately I have been feeling exhausted, depleted, sad and despondent. My mornings have been filled with to do's and my evenings have been occupied by me passing out or zoning out to whatever noise I hear in the background coming from the ocean, from the tv. It hasn't been all work,  I've made enough time to take many photos, appreciate the flowers and remember many stories. 

           I traveled to Kauai to throw the mixed ashes of my grandma and grandpa in the ocean.  With to do's from my mothers death and family obligations and arrangements for my grandparents final memorial,  I have been feeling like a fragmented form of myself.  Self care had gone out the window.  That being the case it took me some time to remember that a swim in the ocean can solve almost any problem.  At least for me.  Its a recharge.  I have always said "Take your problems to the ocean and she will take it away." I had made no time for swimming for three days and the result of that was a shell of myself.  So like most self care acts, I made the time to go swimming.  I left the rest of the world behind and dived in.

When I came to on the other side. Walked on land and found a long lost friend.

There Always Gotta Be a First Day

It was told to me by a dear friend, after I had shown up to class in the extremely inappropriate clothing.  It was my first day of glassblowing.  I knew nothing of what to wear.  You're supposed to wear loose fitting clothes and 100% cotton.  I showed up in tight non cotton leggings wearing a skin tight non cotton dress.  I felt like that girl that was trying to be hot.  In the end I was freaking hot and managed to not burn myself or melt my clothes off.  If the me now saw that girl then, I probably would've just shook my head and thought "poor girl."  As I explained this story to my group of coffee shop buddies, the embarrassment, the sweat, the jokes that came along with what I was wearing. He piped up and said "There's always gotta be a first day."

Sometimes the fear associated with starting something new can cause a type of frozen effect.  As an artist, when I start a project, I normally have a vision, what it is going to look like, the format is normally decided, along with how it is going to be displayed and the significance of the concept.  All this has stopped me from creating a blog.  The things that run through my mind are, 1.  I need an editor, I am dyslexic and I have learned from experience that not being able to speak well or write well can make people think less of you, believe that you are of less intelligence.  2. Where is that perfect title? 3. Will it be personal? Will I only show my art? How much am I willing to share? What does this look like? How do I create a format? 4. I technically have no idea how to even create a blog.

I have looked at some other blogs and I am left with a perception of their perfect lives.  And then I look around my apartment.  Does anyone want to see the dishes in my sink, my burning man gear which is still piled up in the corner almost three months later, my closet that looks more like a storage unit, my bare walls that are still bare despite the fact that I have lived in this apartment for 2 years already.  Oh, I have the art, I just haven't hung it. The Ego of Defeat says  "I am not one of these blogging women. What do I have to offer?" It's all just perception. The truth is simple.  What do I have to offer?  My self.   For I am an artist, a thinker, a person that desires to connect with others, a person that likes to document my thoughts, my journeys, the times in life that make me laugh and smile and the times in life that make me cry.

Yet, I felt stuck.  Where do I start? Then the answer appeared in my brain. "Start with what you know. Start with whats around you." So I know photography... Ok, I will start with that.  Then I remembered my back injury that had put me in bed for most of the day for the past two months. I remembered what I have been telling myself for the past couple of weeks "You can do almost anything for 15 minutes." So thats what I did.  I grabbed my camera, went to get a cup of coffee, and began documenting what would be my first blog entry.  Here is some of what I captured.  

Oftentimes my first view when I wake up in the morning are a couple of trees, this being one of them. I had been thinking "tree when will you become bare and lose your yellow leaves?" It was only after editing that I realized she was well on her way, with just a few leaves left.

  Shifting my perception to the street below.  Vibrant Trees with plenty of color left.

 Standing under the tree, under the branches, for a moment I forgot I was in the city.  It felt like home.  The smell of damp dirt and the scent of trees.  I felt a sense of security. Of safety.

The spider webs reminded me of one of my dreams. A Dream that is for another time.

I  passed beautifully crafted spider webs, took photos of every one, they reminded me of home. Of flowers bowing to the weight of the dew from the fog.  Holding on till the cold finally becomes too strong. I enjoy the chaos that nature creates.  It has a sense of order to it.

 We've been blessed with fog, with mystery.  I lay in bed and watch trees reveal themselves while the background hides.  The landscape comes in and out of focus only showing me what it wants.  It is a beautiful little tease that has become one of the greatest joys of my days.  I had been lying in bed thinking "I wish I could go and photograph it," thinking of a destination that I already had in mind, knowing that my body couldn't make it.  Remember, there's a beautiful world just outside the door.  One need not go far to capture the beauty of life.

Lately I have been thinking of death.  I have been grieving the loss of someone very close to me.  I have been thinking of transformation of space, self, energy.  The landscape around me is a reflection of my thoughts.  Every time I get on a bus, a new historic building has been torn down and they have already begun rapid construction on a new fancy modern apartment or condo complex.  Of course, which all will be too expensive for the majority of the people that live here.  It astonishes me, how quickly something can be torn down, forgotten and replaced.  I can't even remember anymore what stood there before. This building though is closer to home.  I don't know what it will be in the future, that doesn't bother me much, for right now, I am enjoying walking by it and seeing art. Thankfully it is art.

 There are some moments I cant help resist but savor.  One of them is watching the cream hit the coffee, swirling about, creating patterns and swirls of moving painting.  It shall be something that I never get sick of.  I attempted to photograph it here and my lens was fogging up.  So we have a coffee reading instead of a tea reading.  I enjoy looking in, seeing what symbols are created.  Is there a scene in here? What does it say?

That it's time to play with the perception of fog.

If you slow down, if you stop and notice what lies along your path, what beauty can you find close to home? What simple pleasures give you the most joy? It is there, that even in the hardest of times, I found moments of joy.

This post was brought to you by Migraine Fierceness and a Love for Imperfections! 

I would rather have failed many times than have never tried at all...Didn't somebody famous say that?