:art life:

Yes, I am supposed to be on "hiatus" from writing on here like I said last week, but several paths of thought prompted me to return this week. And while the website is still a new priority, truthfully much of last week has been spent doing some overdue Spring cleaning. Much of my life remains in the boxes that I brought them in when I first moved into this current apartment. Part of it truly is for storage reasons, but part of it has been the dreaded "I'll do this some day" curse that applies to too many things in my life. Which is why my to-do list grows and many things get only partially done. So I try to adopt a philosophy of "Some Day is Today." Sometimes it works. But the large list often leads to paralysis too.

Two documentaries that I viewed in the past week inspired me to write. One was "David Lynch: The Art Life." No doubt it was released to coincide with the premiere of the new Twin Peaks series this upcoming weekend, of which I'll probably see the opening episode, but my lack of a TV or cable subscription means that I won't keep up with it until a DVD collection comes out or when it shows up on Netflix, and most likely will be spoiled for me before then by peoples' need to post it all online nearly immediately afterwards. I saw the first series when it was on TV the first time, and revisiting it recently, I realized that that was the only time I had truly seen it, other than a few episodes that I had taped. The story and images had stuck with me that deeply.

The documentary covers Lynch's early life up until his first movie, with him narrating it in his own inimitable way. Mostly it's about his "art life," as he started out as a painter and we get to see him create several new works throughout the film. He seemed to get into film only because he had the idea of paintings with sound, which led to filming them as well. The film concludes with his recollection of the filming of "Eraserhead," and the good fortune of receiving a grant from the American Film Institute, much to his genuine surprise. He muses about what sort of life he would have led if hadn't had this stroke of luck.

This resonated with me because it's clearly that most of what he wanted to was create art. But modern society makes it difficult for those who want just that. The world runs on money, and you need jobs for that money, for who is going to pay you to "just" make art? A frustration I've known all my life.

The other documentary was "Dear Mr. Watterson," about the comic strip "Calvin & Hobbes" and the artist and creator, Bill Watterson. Through interviews of other comic artists and "regular" people we see what it came to mean to them, both at the time it was running and of newer audiences discovering it.

Much is made of his resistance to any kind of merchandising, and of ending the strip well before than he had to, and fighting any of the traps of fame. He wanted the strip to stand on its own, nothing more. One of the interviewees noted that a stuffed Hobbes doll would probably still be making millions today, but part of the point of the strip was that to Calvin, Hobbes was a real tiger. Creating him as an actual toy would take away that magic.

At the end of the documentary it's said that the strip came out at just the right time in history. In today's times of dying print and shrinking comic pages, plus the sheer volume of competition added by various media online as well, it's more and more difficult to stand out among the rest. Something else that I am all too aware of, and probably adds to my recent crisis of thinking "why bother." That's if you're creating with an audience in mind, of course.

But I don't turn off the creative mind if I can help it. Always have some sort of camera with me, of course. This past weekend was the annual Steampunk festival, held in the city where I currently live. However you feel about the genre or of cosplay in general, some people's work in that area can be quite impressive. Some photos from that were added to this group on my flickr page.

:piece by piece:

As promised, I put up a framed original art piece up for sale on my Etsy page. It intentionally has a Valentine's Day theme (through my twisted eyes), so who knows, maybe someone will consider it for a last minute gift. But I'm just trying to get more of the artwork out there, a sale would be a bonus.

I also keep taking advantage of print sales that I manage to come across. Bought a ton more of these small prints of Instagram shots that I intend to put into equally small frames, and will probably add them to the shop, along with selling them at any markets and fairs that I manage to get into. Been trying to get into one of the monthly ones in Lowell, but twice so far they've passed on me, citing too many vendors applying for spaces. Try try again.

The current Homunculus doll is slowly progressing, yet if I spot another one out in my travels, I still buy it if I can. Of course I have no idea what this one will become either. The long hair on it is just ridiculous.

Much of creative time lately has actually been taken up by continuing to work towards a final draft of at least one of my NaNoWriMo novels, and that's not really easy to show in this blog. I've been editing with the aid of a online tool called AutoCrit, which literally goes through the novel piece by piece in various ways. It's amazing how much you can change when you go sentence by sentence. And already I know I need a whole new first chapter. A title is still up in the air for it. The working one is "Devices," but that sounds a bit too plain to me. Another idea is "#embraced," which is from a major plot point, but I'm worried that a hashtag in the title would date it, even though I don't specify a time in the story other than the near future.

:2015 rewind:

Looking back at the past year of entries written here, I saw a lot more artwork done than I originally thought I had before reviewing, although most of it was photography. Not in itself a bad thing, but I don't want to abandon other media. The simple fact is still that it takes less time to take and work on photography than to paint or draw, and sadly an excess of free time is still not a luxury in my current life.

That and other things were repeatedly commented on, like redesigning the website, so I have to make sure that another year doesn't go by without addressing that.

The winter and snow was condensed into nearly one month, and I tried to combat the doldrums by working only in black & white, which was interesting, but there already was an excess of white all around us.

I made up for the gloom in summer, getting to the ocean and sunsets whenever possible. And a spur of the moment trip to Montreal as well.

I did get a few drawings in, from pencil to ink and computer coloring, and I'm pleased with them, but again wish I could complete them quicker. I could never do a monthly comic book at this kind of pace. I do have a graphic novel idea or two still in my brain.

I finished another regular novel for NaNoWriMo again. I haven't revisited it since I finished it in November, but I plan to this weekend. I want to get one of if not both of them published this year. The lack of actual readers last year made me not bother offering it to people this year, but I do need some sort of outside editor to help complete them.

I'm not generally a crafty person, but I painted a few cat banks for my sister in a Dia de Los Muertos style.

There were a few pieces in gallery shows, and I plan to keep on that path. I'm hopeful to make a few more Homunculus dolls and get a show for all of them again.

The nearest I got to being published was being included in a book of artwork of Krampus. It'll do.

I had two fun photoshoots this year, and of course I hope for many more this year, although I'm well aware that I still have room for improvement. I already have ideas for some extra gear. I still wish others would realize that I'm available, or that those who showed initial interest would actually follow through, but I'm probably just going to have to resort to paying for models again.

Last weekend I visited an exhibit on Pixar, at Boston's Museum of Science of all places, and once again it filled me with the desire to somehow find a way to work there. It looks like such a wonderful place to do so, and of course it'd finally be a place to utilize my talents, not like the entirety of my day job history. I've actually applied to them in the past. But I didn't see any current job openings on their website. I know enough from my job hunting research (yes, must escape from that day job, still) that often jobs never even make it to being listed a fair amount of the time. But I need to have something more relevant to show them if I am really to pursue it.

:nanowrimo final week:

I managed to once again finish my 50,000+ word NaNoWriMo novel, and a day early again too. I'm amazed that I was even able to, what with all the frustrating car stuff that was, and sadly still is going on. So that's the biggest lesson that I'm taking away from it, that I can complete something even with a strict deadline and a world of shit going on around me. It was basically a month of dayjob, car shite, and writing. So other things have suffered during this time, like gym time, and other creative projects, and what social events that I was invited to. I had thoughts of trying to keep on this sort of schedule to get other artwork done. but it can get really exhausting, and isolating. The local NaNo folks hold a bunch of write-ins throughout the month, to try and keep some social aspect to it, but judging from the ones that I went to last year, it actually slowed me down, so I guess I'm not a "social" writer. Not if I want to complete a novel in a month, anyway.

Once again the story took off in directions that I had not planned on when starting out. It was supposed to be fairly dystopic in tone, but then it ended with a fairly upbeat conclusion, with touches of caution. I had at least two male characters that I thought would be the main ones, but they faded into the background in favor of two female ones. There was also a weird sexual aspect that emerged that wasn't planned from the beginning either. Again, it's all open to analysis, I'm sure. But I'm not even looking at it again until January at least. I already want a better title for it at least.

After Thanksgiving, there's just no holding back the Xmas juggernaut at all anymore. But the word of Krampus grows more and more with each passing year. There'll be some Krampus-themed events this weekend in Salem, MA, of course, including an art show that I have artwork in. Not a new piece, alas. I'll also mention again the book "Contemporary Krampus" that I have a different piece in. I would choose him over Elf on A Shelf any day.

After such an intensive month spent writing, there has to be some decompression, but I need to get back to other projects, hopefully more so once all the car bullshite is settled. I still need to go through the photos from my October photoshoot. The model mentioned today a wish that she could do an Xmas-themed pinup shoot. That sounds like it'd be fun, alas not likely for this year's Xmas.

:nanowrimo week four:

Can't stop to chat now, I'm at 38,000 words and 50,000 are expected for one to "win" NaNoWriMo at the end of the month.

:nanowrimo week three:

Past the half-month point for NaNoWriMo, and mainly because of the car mess, I'm behind in the schedule that they give as a guide. I should be at 30,000 words, I'm at just under 25,000. I'll get right back at it after this blog post. I believe I found a car earlier tonight, so hopefully that mess will be cleared up soon.

I still find myself writing the female characters easier than the male ones. I was dragging on the last chapter because I was having difficulty with writing Joe. I was very close to killing him off just to not have to deal with him anymore, but I was merciful and only crashed his truck. One really becomes the god of your own personal universes when you're writing.

:draft pick:

I spent most of the past week or so getting my NaNoWriMo novel, "Emotion Blur," out of first draft status. To be truthful I didn't really alter too much of the basic story. It was more correcting grammar or filling in missing words. As ever, I think faster than I write or type, and so may miss a few words along the way. I am still a bit ambivalent about the first few chapters after the initial one, as they involve characters that never show up again, but there are facts and such in those chapters that refer to later plot points. So I am torn. Any further edits will have to be in another person's hands.

All told, I think it's a decent story, for my first attempt, but I am unsure if it has any hope of actually getting published. I'll look into it but it's not a giant priority this year. Those of you out there who have my first draft, perhaps you'd rather read this one (so far only one person has given me feedback about it), so get back to me if you do.

Still on the lookout for photo ops in my monochrome winter. Now that I'm free from the writing for now I hope to find some more. I'm seeing a live concert this Saturday night, Zola Jesus, we'll see if I can get some good shots there, but I don't want to spend the whole night doing so. It's sad enough that there'll surely be a sea of phones being held up by people, recording instead of actually enjoying it while one is there.

Chinese New Year is approaching as well, and I'd like to go and photograph the lion dancers as I have for nearly every year for the past decade. I may even go to New York CIty this time. I'm not so sure black & white would be the best choice, though, as they're quite colorful. We'll see if I break out of monochrome for that at least.