Silence is the safest course for any man to adopt who distrusts himself - François de la Rochefoucauld
Work is killing me right now. In lieu of my little ramblings, I offer up a plentiful helping of some interesting reads from other sources.
Finding your inner bigot. Even though we vehemently deny them, we all have deeply seeded prejudices that may come out in very subtle ways. Very interesting article about these buried traits. I know I have a few to work through.
I watched The Men Who Stare at Goatslast night. It is a light comedy with some interesting views on soldiers, war, blind faith in causes, and super powers. Kevin Stacey, George Clooney, Ewan McGregor, and Jeff Bridges play their parts well. This is not a paradigm changing war movie. It is just a funny movie that left me with some interesting questions. Men Who Stare... is worth a view if it comes on cable and Netflix (currently available through instant queue).
Welcome to a new week.
PHOTO NOTE: Valya exudes a powerful, quiet erotic allure. I really need to get back to New York to work with her again.
Lines to Her Heart (Photographed on a cold day in late November)
We are having a very warm October in northern California. It is supposed to be 91 in SF today, which is a novelty to me (I've lived here for 13 years). I am hoping to go up to the Napa/Sonoma wine country this weekend to see the grape vines changing colors.
As for winter, maybe it is my dark side, but it is my second favorite season. I love the short days, long nights, angular sun, rain/snow, bare trees, cool days and cold nights. I love skiing (both types) and breathing in the cold air into my lungs. I love walking in the snow (something I miss since moving from Montana) and hearing the crunch of it under my feet. There is nothing more peaceful than walking during a quiet snow fall.
I find winter very erotic and sensual. The red of the wines, the glow of the fire, the warm food, and the need to be beside someone. The long nights give us time to explore each other without feeling guilty of missing daylight playing and chores. All of these put me much more in the mood than spring flowers and bright days.
Maybe another reason I love fall is that it is the foreplay for my winter. Who doesn't love a whole season of foreplay?
I lost my virginity in winter, fell in love for the first time in winter, and also lost a friend in winter (see link below.) Winter is not subtle in its attributes or what we humans do during it, at least not for me.
Below are some links to other posts I wrote about winter. At the bottom is a zen video showing both the beauty and solitude of winter, and one young man's life during it.
As for this blog, I am working on the fall (for me) of a photographic god, building a new art community, and my continued studies in photography. They should be spilling out pretty soon.
It's weird that photographers spend years or even a whole lifetime, trying to capture moments that added together, don't even amount to a couple of hours. ~James Lalropui Keivom
Doesn't that pretty much sum up life as well? When I am on my deathbed, I won't remember the decades of detritus, I will remember the those bits of life that made it mean something. Why should photography be any different?
When you photograph people in colour you photograph their clothes. But when you photograph people in B&W, you photograph their souls! ~Ted Grant
I disagree. I could say that when you photograph a person in B&W, you photograph their shape, texture and contours. When you photograph someone in color, you photograph the life they put into their shape texture and contours. Someone I know thinks black and white nudes can be art, but color ones can't. I think these people have their preferences and can live with them. Their preferences shouldn't be the only preferences for all.
I am a busy boy with thousands of images to edit and figure out how to present. Work is super busy with pushing out employee training deliverables (business speak)on a really crap project that I can not control. Personal life is full with visitors, yard work, and other obligations.
I am tempted to create the blog version of a clip show and hope that will do. For those who have been spared the pain of watching clip shows on TV, they are a cheap and easy ploy where the characters reminisce about things that happened on prior episodes. The scene clips from those earlier episodes offer very little new content, just a cheap filler. They are easy and cheap to make. They are similar and about as inspiring as a greatest hits album.
In an effort to avoid creating a clip show, I am going to do the next cheesiest thing - stealing... errr... I mean aggregating (hate that term)... err, spotlighting things I've seen or read lately and not offering much for an opinion on them. Seriously though, they are interesting nuggets and insights into art and music.
Here are some interesting quotes from the McChrystal career-ending issue of Rolling Stone (July 8 -22, 2010). Text emboldened by me for emphasis. None of the quotes are from the McChrystal article.
Interview with veteran rocker Tom Petty being asked about his new album, Mojo.
Interviewer: To me, this album has a feeling of being on the run, outrunning the cops...
Petty: ... or outrunning life itself. I didn't write it as a theme. Inevitably, though you find a theme creeping in. But any attempt to intellectualize my stuff embarrasses me.
From the article about Lady Gaga.
The former Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotto is on a mission: to prove that Lady Gaga is art and that her art is not a mask. It is her life.
"I'll always have one high heel in New York City. I live in Hollywood, but you can't make me love Hollywood. I'll never love Hollywood."
"I think, creatively as a woman, you change once you give birth. I'm totally not ready for that."
"When you resign your life to something like art music or art or writing, you have to commit yourself to this struggle and commit yourself to pain. And I commit myself to my heartbreak wholeheartedly. It's something that I will never let go. But that heartbreak, in a way, is my feature. It's a representation of the process of my work. As artists, we are eternally heartbroken."
"... So I guess I am a woman now. I don't know when or why you realize that you've become a woman, but I'm different. I feel different. And I care less and less about what people think as the hours go by. I feel very strong."
"I don't want people to see I'm a human being. I don't even drink water onstage in front of anybody, because I want them to focus on the fantasy of the music and be transported from where they are to somewhere else. People can't do that if your just on Earth. We need to go to heaven.
"Some people need to be reminded it's OK to be different."
"When I wake up in the morning, I feel just like any other insecure 24-year-old girl. But I say, 'Bitch, you're Lady Gaga, you better fucking get up and walk the walk today.'"
"Music is a lie. Art is a lie. You have to tell a lie that is so wonderful that your fans make it true."
Interviewer: It's interesting to speak with you, becuase you have this ineffectual and artistic side, but half of your hits are about clubbing and being drunk...
Lady Gaga: Well, now I have a little bit more of an opportunity to be that, don't I? I don't mean to speak arrogantly about my musical strategy as a pop artist in the Warholian sense, but today you have to almost trick people into listening to something intelligent." Interviewer: So you're thinking, "I'm going to trick this idea down your throat"? Lady Gaga: Or seduce people to be interested in something uncomfortable. And I have been for three years baking cakes -and now I'm going to bake a cake that has a bitter jelly. The message of the new music is now more bitter than it was before. Because the sweeter the cake, the more bitter the jelly can be.
For those who stuck it out to this point, I am interested in hearing from you what you think of these two performers and their art and quotes. I become increasingly fascinated by Lady Gaga the more I learn about her and see her videos. I wonder if she has staying power to remain current or ahead of current trends or will she fade into oblivion in the next few years.
Here are a few of her videos. The first, Alejandro, is filled with amazing imagery from many different themes and genres. The second video, Telephone, is an interesting twist on the Thelma and Louise, Kill Bill, and femme fatale themes in cinema. The final video, Bad Romance, has very interesting retelling of old movie archetypes and themes mixed with a Matrix sensibility.
I am enjoying a clear morning break after days of rain and gray. I love the dark days and the rain, but the sunny Berkeley morning is nice too.
