Dream-Based Artwork: The Empress

I've been having these really intense dreams lately, probably because I'm gearing up for my art show.

Last night, I dreamed that I saw myself laying on a cold tile floor. I didn't know where I was, and I couldn't move, but I could hear the ocean. A woman in red robes was suspended over the water. Somehow I knew she was called The Empress.  

She was talking about training warriors, and it felt like she was talking about me. But because I couldn't move in the dream, I didn't exactly feel like a warrior...so what she was saying didn't have a context. 

Anyhow, I decided to make a collage about it.

Rhiannon and Dez have a really cool blue tile floor in the bathroom of their apartment, so I set up a tripod and took a photo of myself laying there, pretending I was dead. I tried to paint the rest of the scene, and excerpted a quote from one of my all-time favorite books, 365 Days of Tao. This quote is the closest thing to what the red-robed woman was trying to tell me.

PATTERNS: A TRILOGY

I love Patterns.

Jamie Travis is a brilliant filmmaker.

“One of the most original voices in Canadian cinema” (The Toronto Sun). Recurring themes of childhood frailty and self-conscious suspense—alongside painstakingly designed interiors and soothing songs of sorrow—have engendered a distinct and consistent cinematic universe that straddles the divide between Sad and Funny.

“His shorts combine the macabre subject matter of David Lynch and Todd Solondz with the art direction of Wes Anderson. The end result is something that seems wholly original and much more than pastiche… Passivity isn’t really an option when watching his films as the mise en scène is handled with the meticulousness of a serial killer.” (Ion Magazine, Vancouver)




You're going to have to search to get a copy of Patterns: A Trilogy, which is one of his early films. It's worth the hunt.

UNGODLY HANDSOME MAN #234: RICHARD GERE

Taking a break from making art for my show next week, and I'm watching American Gigolo.  

Richard Gere is ungodly handsome circa 1980.  In the film,  Lauren Hutton can't sleep after initially meeting him...she's all riled up until she finds out where he lives, and shows up to see him again.

Full frontal.

If there are sharp, protruding silhouettes in my artwork tomorrow, forgive me.

I've been in the apartment for too long...

But I think I like it most when his character says:  "This is my apartment. Women don't come here."

EVERYONE WANTS TO BE A BARTENDER THESE DAYS...

I don't mean to sound frustrated, but working nights is hard as hell sometimes.  I'm probably faster than I ever was before the coma, and I move like I'm playing a video game, but people are crazy these days. They lack accountability.

Tonight, some guy started swatting one of the antique hanging lights atop the bar in a desperate attempt to get my attention when I was really busy.  Since Rhiannon and Dez really value their decor, I found that annoying.

So I grabbed his wrist and twisted it half a turn, then pressed my thumb into that really sensitive pressure point where the veins stick out.  It shocked him.  He yelled, "I'm a patron*!" and I said, "No one here cares, and you're lucky I'm the one telling you not to deface the property - the owners would probably kill you.  Don't touch anything besides your drink."

Sometimes I hate that I have to do this for money.  I like the fast pace, sure, and I meet some cool people.  But customers are way too entitled these days - maybe they think they have power now that  they can write online reviews.  Pre-recession, I used to make $800 - $1,000 per night - all cash.  Now it's more like $300 - $500, which is a bit depressing.  I have some serious medical bills to deal with, and I hope my art show later this month takes it all next level.

I need to focus on what I want to do...which is to be an artist.  

PS: Just realized tonight upon writing that patron (the word for customer) is the same word as Patron (the tequila brand).

NOTE TO SELF OR SOMETHING

I went out last night.  Today, when I went through my purse, I found a note that read: "Immortal Technique." I have no recollection of how it got there, or what it means.  It was written in purple ink.

ARTWORK: POWDERED BONES

I'm working on this mixed media art piece for my first art show, called 'Powdered Bones'.  It's based on a self portrait I took one day when I literally felt like my heart was bleeding.

I don't know how to express how that feels except to say that it's like love and longing mixed with betrayals that haven't occurred yet, but which you know are coming.

I wrote this poem based on a recent dream about love and heartbreak, and decided to use it to add another layer to the visual imagery.  

HEX (A Sort of Werewolf)

We ended as everything ends eventually.  30 days later, I awoke scratching mad, animalist penchant.  My skin began to itch once you were gone.  There is no one else to accuse.  I was so used to your pigment. 

You put a hex on me…

                       

You used to study Egyptology, Osiris and Isis, the Book of the Dead.  You used to draw hieroglyphics on my bare shoulders, running fingers over scars, mapping my follicles. Now you’ve put a hex on me & I don’t feel human.  The moon tides are running in my blood – a wolf is rising up inside of me, skeletal lines shivering under honed muscle. 

 

This hex is doing some crazy things.  My eyes glitter silver.  I itch ribs, the length of arms, stomach, and curse your knowledge of alchemy.  You used to turn lead into gold, and now you’re punishing me.  I can’t get you off my skin.

My fingernails are destructive;  I have weeping cuticles.  I’d like to show you what you’ve done.  Naked, would you recognize the taste of my skin, the altered texture?  This is one bad break up.  Night wears heavy upon me, white magnet & I could razor you in half.  I am a sleepless metal shadow.

 

NIGHTMARES

From childhood, I’ve had trouble sleeping…staying up until 5 or 6 in the morning, as though I needed the cold reality of daylight to soothe me.  The monsters are not as frightening when you can see them clearly.

 

Native Americans believe that when we dream we go into another dimension.  I know this.  Every day I wake up exhausted, with burning muscles, as though I have fought a tremendous battle.  My nightmares are vivid paroxysms of blood & death.  I don’t know how to draw the line between dreams & reality. 

Often, I am fighting myself.  There is something primal living under my skin.  There is a slow-burning rage, and a sense of urgency.

 I hope that by writing this down, I can make better sense of it all.