The Black Swan (who didn't have any clothes on but no body told her)

I saw “The Black Swan” and all I can say is… Ha! 

Seriously folks is this a joke?  Is this… a joke?  I’ll grant you, it was a hysterically funny joke, a steaming pile of hokey goodness.  Laughable moments, real laughable moments abound.  And I’m pretty sure they aren’t supposed to be there.    

So why is everyone taking it so seriously?  I feel a little bit like the Emperor’s New Clothes.  I think people are being tricked into seeing this film as something with artistic integrity, a serious film about ballet, a psychosexual drama, an innovative achievement.  And I’m seeing a film that relies heavily on its visual styling (which I’m not in love with), as it tells a pretty thin story about a ballet dancer’s decent into madness!  Ahhh….   Swoon!   Surprise! 

I should confess first that I don’t love ballet.  I have given it the old college try but as a storytelling means, dance isn’t my favorite form.   But I respect ballet, and I know enough of the real troubles that ballet dancers have to; not be shocked by things like bulimia, broken toe nails, and mental instability.  In fact, I thought they could have come up with some more gruesome toe shots, because ballerina’s feet are typically not all that pretty.   

I guess that what really bothers me.  The real world of ballet, we’re talking about the upper echelon, it is a physically brutal, mentally exhausting, and unstable place to be.  I’ve seen, read, and heard really heart wrenching tales of people climb to the top in the world of dance.  It’s not as though, the material wasn’t ripe… but the handling.  So over the top campy! 

Natalie Portman wander through the film looking as if she were on the verge of tears the entire time.  Oh life is so hard for poor Nina (Natalie)!  She is the victim of everything and everyone!   With her timid voice, her constant whimpering, and trembling on the verge of tears…  I just wanted slap her.  I really did.  Oh mommy’s being creepy and undressing again, oh no the director is forcing himself me again, oh now the young ballet dancer is coming on me again… I’m going to whimper and cry and scratch myself!

The big duality of the film, can Nina play the virgin swan and the whore swan?  Literally one of her directions from her director is to go home and “touch herself”.  Which she does and then realizes her mother is in the room.   Which… her mom is standing constant vigil; I would think that when Nina wakes up she doesn’t just assume that her mother is going to be there.   And wow, that’s deep territory women being broken down in the two categories of the virgin and the whore. 

I’m going to give it to the Black Swan that the sex scenes are… well, different.   Wait I can’t tell if I’ve giving them too much credit or too little.  I want to point out that in the past, even the not too distant past, the image of a woman climaxing in masturbation or from cunnilingus would be enough to stick a movie with a NC-17 label.  So bravo getting that through censorship.  It’s such a weird system on how they judge and rate movies.

 

And for a film about ballet, and for someone who doesn’t particularly love dance, I was disappointed that there wasn’t more actual ballet in the film.  Hear me out, the people in the film are eating, sleeping and breathing ballet… they live for it, they die for it, I thought it might be nice to see some actual high quality passionate dance that showed me why it worth living for, why it was worth dying for.  I feel the film fails at conveying the passion of ballet. And if the only emotion that Nina has is wimpy terror, being on the verge of crying at all points of the film, I'm sure a prima ballerina could handle that.  And maybe the dancing would be more exciting.

And then there is the back and forth, is she hallucinating, is this reality, just gets old quick.  And laughable too.  Maybe if it didn’t feel like over the top camp, some of the hallucination tricks would work.  Maybe if I wasn’t routing for Nina to die and be ut out of her misery I’d feel differently.  Even the big climax of the film didn’t feel all that climactic.  And pet peeve, if you’ve seen the trailer, you have seen all of the best shots in the movie.  There weren’t a whole lot of new stunning images.

I cannot believe this is a film people are raving about, I cannot believe it will win awards.  It’s a terrible campy cheese fest.  And I would think that years from now people will wonder what the fuss was about.

Blegh!

But I understand that I am in the vast minority of people who feel this way.  I didn’t see art, or anything too psychologically disturbing, Twilight all over.

The worst thing is I love an older movie also called The Black Swan which is about pirates, and stars Tyrone Power and Maureen O'Hara.  So I'll be clarifying which movie I liked for years to come.

Closing time...

I'm closing this blog to public for now, but don't worry it might not be forever.

I'm applying to be on the Bravo TV show Work of Art and while I'm leaving a bunch of my blogs public, this one is a little more personal.  And I don't know that if I were on Work of Art, that I would want people reading my yearly letters to dad and whatnot.

So for now I'm making this private.

Kate

Fantastic Beasts...

Long has it been my desire to mount the head of some fantastic beast to my wall.

Believe it or not, while I hardly ever work in 3D, I feel like sculpture is where my passion lies. Maybe it's just because I do it so infrequently. Sculpture takes time, space and usually a bit more money than I have. Plus you have to store it or give it away, or I suppose sell it, but I don't even know where to begin selling my work. I do actually sell my work on occasion. But it's rare.

Anyway, this project has long been in my mind, and all I needed was a really good excuse. I had one with my Work Of Art Project. The challenge was a team project of opposite words. Well... let me start again, a couple of weeks back the challenge was temporary art, and I made a piñata, a bird piñata.

It gave me a taste for working with paper-mâché again. In the past and on the whole, I've not been very good with paper-mâché. I find it difficult and time consuming. It's chief merits being that it's inexpensive and light weight.

I was seduced my the medium when I found success with the bird and was eager to try my hand at it again.

My friend Jeff Grader was always good with paper-mache. I though of him often while working on this. I'm sure he's made similar pieces at some point or another.

When I was thinking of opposite words, I immediately thought that Beth and I should find words that would give me an excuse to make my paper head. What can say I'm selfish.

I had plenty of inspiration for the fantastic beast's head. Dr. Seuss made an amazing serious of heads. My cousin Matt is a hunter and has many heads mounted on his walls. I've always been a tad jealous, but never wanted actual taxidermy heads myself. They strike me as terribly expensive. And of course there are all of the animals out there.

We came up with the idea for our opposite words, carnivore and vegetarian. Very exciting. Beth hasn't been able to make her heads yet and that's my fault, I was slow in sending her supplies. I thought id we used some of the same supplies our pieces would tie in together.

I came up with this for vegiterian. It's a mix between a cow and a gazelle and maybe a hippo. It has a sort of hippo mouth and chin.

It's all paper except for the wooden base. It is not in fact duct tape on the horns. It's silver paper.

And it was a labor of love.

I found that gorgeous orange paper on sale at the fancy paper store and couldn't resist it. But the spots you see on it are actually eyelets with holes. Which I could have easily filled by putting two layers on the head. But no... I liked the dark spot in the middle, so I spent hours pasting tiny pieces of paper into each hole. Why not just past a layer underneath? Because the orange paper was too transparent. Which leads me to the other problem. Where did I get the little spots of paper? Glad you asked... see the stripes on his forehead? I cut up the darker stripes for the spots. How fascinating you say! I know. It's riveting.

I only mention it because as I sat there working the damned head, labor of love, it hit me. Ah yes, this is what it is to be an artist. It's all about torturing yourself and caring too much about whatever it is you are making. It's a strange compulsion that keeps you going. It forces patience, along with impatience, rage, frustration, futility, hope, confidence. In the end you find out if it was worth it or not.

In this case I just sit around beaming at it. Shocked and pleased at how well it turned out. A long time goal finally accomplished. I'll kiss him on the nose for the hundredth time tonight and beam at him some more tomorrow.

I have trouble saying this sometimes. I'm proud of this piece. I really am.

I owe them an apology....

And it's long overdue...
This goes out to Beach House:

I'm sorry, and I was wrong. I was very wrong.

Long have I tauted Beach House as the worst band ever. You have to understand, this goes way back... about three years. My sister and I were going to see in concert The Clientèle in concert.

For those of you who know me well this might be met with a thunderous "What Kate see live music? Go to a concert? Has she taken leave of her senses?"

Because it's true, I hate live music like poison, the crowds, the loudness of concerts, the lack of anything to do during the concert... Don't get me wrong I like music, and live music can very cool, provided I don't have to attend the concert. It's just I never just listen to music without doing anything else. I read, or draw or clean or work, or walk or dance while I listen to music. I hate concerts because to me it's unnatural to just sit and listen to music.
But every once and a while I can be talked into going to a concert.

Thus the case with The Clientele, a band that I know one of their songs... Reflections After Jane.This is again a cause for alarm because if I love a band and know a whole bunch of their songs I will go their concert, because I can sing along. It's something to do.

Beach House was opening for the Clientele at the MFA, and from what I had read, they were an exciting band on the rise. I liked the name, but Beach House not so much. The singer explained early in that key on her keyboard was broken and it was throwing off the sound a bit. Which gave them a little sympathy because they sounded terrible. Nobody was applauding after the songs, and they sat on the stuffy little stage for what seemed like eternity. I think it was for about an hour. At one point they started a really pretty song, but soon the keyboard struck sour again. Beth and I decided that this poor band needed some encouragement. Not because we liked them, no this was out of pity, because we could imagine being trapped on stage with a broken keyboard, knowing that we had to finish the set, as people talked through or simply walked out on us. A few people joined us but our pity applause was even worse than no applause at all. After they finished, they told us their new CD was on sale in the lobby. It was met with shocked silence. And I thought broken keyboard or not this is worst band I've ever seen.

But I was wrong, so very wrong.

Years later, I read another glowing review that dreamy band Beach House. I thought, oh you've got to be kidding, that was the worst band I've ever seen. But I've only ever read glowing reviews of Beach House and I thought to myself, I have to check into this again. I picked the album that they had just released when we saw them.
I listened to it and... it really is dreamy and lovely. I'm slightly obsessed with the song "Wedding Bell"

I owe Beach House an apology because I for years I've been wrong about them. I've been telling the story of the worst concert ever. A broken keyboard had tricked me, I see Beach House in a wonderous new light.

And it's great.

Happy birthday dad!

Dear Dad,

Another year has passed. I can’t quite believe it. I am still out of work but you’ll understand that I don’t really want to talk about it. Beth got married! And by all reasonable accounts it was a great success. While it lacked some of the pomp and circumstance that you may liked it was a highly personal ceremony and I think you’d have appreciated that . Beth is such an individual, I know you’d be proud of how she arranged things.

I performed the ceremony, and I did try to include you in it. I took my cues from various best man speeches I have seen in movies and on TV. There is a nice formula used where you veer between funny and unabashed sincerity, and if you can choke up at least once, it’s a crowd pleaser. This is what I learned. And although I felt extremely emotional that day, and I worried that I would break down and cry several times, I held it together and I think you’d be proud of that.

I wish you could have been at the wedding. We had so much fun. I had so much fun. Beth true to form jumped into the swimming pool in her wedding dress. I don’t think I could have been more proud of her, she is so spirited. I followed suit and as my dress was already wet, I continued to swim in it through out the day. I love to swim. You know that. In a way it was more fun to swim in a dress because it is taboo and I felt like I was getting away with something. You’d be proud.

Chardie was a great credit to you. Taking up much of your role as firefighter, cooling the little flare ups that occurred. He did so much for the wedding and was sweet about it. As did Caryn, my sounding board for much of the lead up.

I came to an interesting conclusion through all of this, about my role as a middle child. Middle children are known as peacekeepers. You knew that. You were a middle child. But suddenly it occurred to me what a peacekeeper is… it’s not always nice, and it’s not always good or right. I’m more of a peacekeeper in the military sense, you know those “peace keeping” missions. You know the ones, the ones that the “peacekeepers” go in with guns and flamethrowers to keep the peace. When it’s over you look around at the innocent civilians that were hurt and you think “Wow, that was bad. I didn’t think that would happen.” But it’s a lie you knew the consequences when you started and you hoped, but weren’t sure, that it was for the greater good. And maybe it was necessary, but you’ll never be sure. That was me. I did that, and I don’t know that I should have. But I think that’s what middle children do sometimes, in the name of peace. I have to keep eye on that kind of behavior but I think you know what I mean. And I think you’ve played that role before.

Which brings me to the next role I’ve played too much lately, of secret keeper. I have taken in secrets that I sigh… I crave, I love being on the inside of anything. And once I’m in, I want to get out. I actually hate holding the secrets. I have a hard time with that. I need to stop looking for secrets.

It’s strange now that wedding is over, I worked so hard on it, now that it’s over there is a great void. An enormous void. A void so large I fear I’m going to get sucked in. I don’t even know what means but I’m standing on the edge of something, and I’m afraid.

Brian and I did well though. We’ve been more sensitive to each other and it’s made a difference. You’d be proud of him, he’s well loved by his friends and family and forever charming.

And Beth of course you’d be proud of. She picked a winner in John, he’s a sweet guy and a rare individual. The two of them make a nice balance.

I’ve been an emotional wreck lately. Leaving Beth at the airport I hugged her tight and told her it was the best wedding ever and just let the sobs rack through us. I wasn’t sure why we were crying or what made it so hard to say goodbye but it was. Even saying goodbye to John I hugged him too tight and told him how happy I was that he married Beth. It was all very unlike me.

I wish you have been there at the wedding. I wish you could ever have tasted my Mai Tais, I made them for the wedding, five gallons of Mai tais that people complained were too strong. Which I think means they were perfect. I told Stephanie, how I learned to make Mai Tais from a stewardess on the way to Hawaii. We had ordered Mai Tais on the plan, now mind you it was 10am, and she told us we could buy Mai Tais or she could show us how to make better Mai Tais and save a dollar. The Mai tai was amazing. She was amazing. And now my Mai Tais are amazing.

I wish I had more to say about me. My year was filled with complicated emotions, water, a trip to Portland. I explored a cave! You would have loved to do that. And dad, I’m skiing, I’m really skiing! I mean I’m still no good at it. But I’m getting over all of that fear and it’s so much fun! I skied in snow and rain, and 10 degree weather and I had fun! And the Ski lodges, Oh dad, I love the lodge… I could spend all day in a ski lodge drinking and looking around and watching the skiers. I wish more than anything, that I could show you skiing.

And I was productive in the last year, more art that ever, and I have to get back to that. My favorite pieces were the circus girls, the illustrations for undone, intricate, and idle. I’d like to think that you can all of it.

It’s the Greek festival this week. I plan on going several times and I’ll think of you when I’m there.

And mom has been a champ this year. I love her and am so proud of her. Look in on her garden if you get the chance, it’s something special. And she handled the wedding and the stresses that lead up to it was much grace and stoicism. Despite my peacekeeping efforts.

I love you. I would tell you more but… I would be here all day.

I wish you could have been at the wedding. I know you’d like John.

They used say I was the one most like you, but they stopped and I can’t help wonder if it’s because I failed to be more like you. Maybe they’ve forgotten what you were like. Maybe I was never so much like you. I’ve been called a rock lately. It’s one of those compliments that gets under my skin. I don’t want to be a rock or the wind beneath somebody’s wings. I can’t imagine anyone does. Sure I try to be a good friend, and be there for people but I am an exciting and dynamic person who shines on her own.

I’ve also vowed that if I ever get married I will only elope. I’ll send postcards from Vegas saying “Guess what? Kate got Married!” Mom can throw a party after.

And my birthday was awesome, I spent it with my pal Linda pretending we were in Mexico, drinking only bottled water, due to a burst pipe that affected all of greater Boston. And we may have had a few drinks that day. Bar hopping and joking about the water situation. It was a good day.

I love you.

And happy birthday dad!

Love,

The Kate

.

A tale of two snowboarders...

Let me start by saying I know how to get off a ski lift. Whether I believe in any other ability that I have when skiing, I know I can get off the list. My sister taught me to ski and the one thing she was adamant about was that I wouldn’t be afraid of the chairlift. Well she was also adamant about always skiing in control so I wouldn’t hurt anyone. So chairlifts, despite things like a fear heights, a complete lack of confidence, and sometimes ability, have rarely been a problem for me. Because Beth told me I absolutely would not be afraid of chairlifts. She simply wouldn’t have it.

And I’m fairly decent about getting out of the way of beginner, and have been known to take sharp turns off to avoid crowds and fallen folk. And even that horrific couple of newbie snowboarders who strapped in both feet to their snowboards before exiting the lift, the guy talked about jumping from the lift while we were way up high… they weren’t too much of a problem for me. I was convinced we were all going to die but in fact as they took each other out I skied away unharmed. It was the beginner lift and anything goes on that one, I once just stood and watched as chair after chair emptied the content onto the snow in heaps. I mean they stopped the lift between the pile ups but still it was like a circus.

But somehow I knew the snowboarder next to me was going to be trouble. He couldn’t keep his board off of my skis while riding up. It was annoying and his lack of trying to move it off was pissing me off. But I thought he’ll move it when we get off he has to. And he did… sort of… he moved it under my skis. So I sat back on the chairlift and lifted my skis so he could move his board which he did for a second, because when I stood up the board was back under me. He whipped the board out from under me, which send me back on the chair which at this point was starting to turn. I let out a yelp and realized quickly that I had to jump onto the ramp… where he was standing, not moving about 5 feet ahead of me. And he was staring at me. Like this was my bad. I narrowly missed him and skied off to the side and looked back at him. There was no apology, no my bad… just him looking at me like I had almost hit him. Because it was somehow my fault that his board was under my skis?

That’s not really how exiting a lift works. We all have our own allotted space and clearly he was in my space. Because my feet on skis are set straight ahead and that is my space, I can’t move them anyplace else.

He was a newbie. He didn’t know what he was doing, and that shouldn’t have pissed me off as much as he did. But he was an arrogant newbie. His friend had mentioned that they should have started on the bunny slopes, which we weren’t on. He was very confident that he should be on these slopes. He was arrogant. And back in the day, when I was a newbie, I let people know just in case I screwed up getting off a lift. Just to give them the heads up. I wouldn’t have been nearly as pissed off as I was if he had attempted an apology. Or if he had warned me or showed something akin to humility. But he was just a jerk. It’s guys like that who give snowboarders a bad name.

Other snowboarders are awesome folk… weeks ago I had one of those moments. You know those moments when you recognize something wonderful in a stranger. I was on the chairlift, the slow one, the one that takes 15 minutes to get up and I was sitting next to the most darling snowboarder. He was a doll, so young and fresh and sweet… after about two minutes of talking to him I was confused as to whether I wanted to adopt him or marry him.

It was early in the morning and about 15 degrees out. No one was there. I just wanted someone else on the lift with me so I rushed to load on with him.

We must have looked like quite the pair on the lift, each of us had about an inch of skin showing. He was wearing a ski mask and goggles like me, all I could see was his beard and his mouth, and yeah he was young enough that I’m pretty sure I shouldn’t have been looking at his mouth. At least not the way I was looking at it.

We talked about skiing, and snowboarding, my friends who were learning to snowboard, my own ski lessons, where he had snowboarded so far, where I was going to go next. We talked about conditions on the mountain, and his dad who was demoing skis. We talked about how it can be traumatic to wipe out and how fear is the biggest obstacle and building confidence is the key. He told me about his dad wiping on Ralphs run, and that’s why he was back on the bunny slopes. He talked about Hitchcock being a wonderful trail, I hadn’t been on it yet, it might be too steep I told him (weeks later this would become my favorite trail). It was all very ordinary stuff. Stuff I’ve said to many other people on the lift. There was nothing special about it at all. It’s just I could have talked to him for hours based on that 15 minute conversation. And it was with great reluctance that I told him to have a good run and skied off the lift.

I couldn’t tell you what was so darling about him (and believe me darling he was) or what I found so attractive; remember I could barely see him through the layers or why these 15 minutes stuck with me. It’s always wonderful to make a connection like that, and on a cold and quiet morning it warmed a part of me that wanted warmth.

So my darling snowboarder whoever you are, thank you for that warm moment.

Playing possum...

I should post here more often. Between my Illustration Friday Blog and my tumblr log, I neglect this blog the most. And it's the oldest, most important and least read of my blogs.

So what's with the possum?

Well the possum is me. Or it's how I think of myself artistically a good deal of the time. Yeah, I tend to think my work looks like it was drawn by a small animal without opposable thumbs with a broken crayon.

Anyway, I was disparaging my work the other day and I said this about my drawing compared to a friends:

Mine look like a possum drew them! Your bodies look human, mine look like weird dolls that are broken or made by another no talent possum!

And this image sprung to mind. The possum holding his hand out in the classic "no photographs please" pose as she drew some of my work for me. You know the world can't know I've been letting a possum do my work for me. PETA would be furious. And catch my cute little loop there what is the possum drawing? Me no doubt drawing the possum.

But what this little exercise made my think about is what animal other artists would think drew their work for them. Would the long and elegant lines of my friend be a lemur? A greyhound. A sparrow?

I'm growing fond of my little alter ego... I'll think about possums a little longer.