Adorable Mug Giveaway!

The Dainty Squid is giving away four adorable artsy mugs for your drinking and or decorative pleasure. Click the link for details

Write one leaf

For all you writers out there, I found this blog, Write One Leaf. It’s nothing but writing prompts and I thought it was kinda cool. One of the prompts they posted today was to write one leaf about candlelight. So here’s my stab at it, it’s pretty much steam of consciousness. I only checked the spelling but I’m sure there’s grammar problems but whatever… if you’re looking for some quick writing exercises to help with the writers block, or to just warm up the creativity I’d suggest checking the site out it. Have fun

Write One Leaf about Candlelight

I lit a candle in memory of you. It sits on my counter top, and when it flickers I like to tell myself it’s your way of saying hello, telling me you’re not quite gone. I watch the white wax dripping to the bottom in globs of chunky heat, the pool of wax getting bigger at the top, exposing more wick, exposing more me. I just want to let it burn, all the way down to that nubby little metal part that keeps the wick from falling out at the bottom, but I can’t. Every time it gets close to the end, I panic and run around the house frantically trying to find a new candle to transfer the flame to. I guess there’s this part of me that believes that there’s this piece of you in that flame, and if I let it go out, you will be gone completely. All I’ll have left will be a fleeting memory of you, that will fade away on that skinny trail of smoke that curls to the top of my ceiling when there is nothing left to burn for.

The Artist is Present, But I’m Not: A response to Marina Abramović’s MoMA exhibit

This past weekend my friends and I went into the city to see the Tim Burton exhibit at the MoMA ( Museum of Modern Art). While the exhibit was all I had hoped it would be, it was not the show stopper of the day. There was another exhibit that seemed to haunt me long after we had left the museum and started downing three dollar margaritas at Mother Burger ( at the corner of 49th and 9th, go check it out!). The exhibit was titled The Artist is Present, brought to you by the apparently “prolific”, Marina Abramović . I didn’t know much about the exhibit ( except that there were live nude models being used for some of the pieces), but from what I had heard about it, it didn’t really seem like something I would be into viewing. After getting a taste of the exhibit on my way up to the Tim Burton section, I was POSITIVE I would not be interested in viewing the rest of it.

As we were making our way up to the fifth floor, we realized there was a “performance” of sorts going on in one of the entryways. Spectators were watching a stoic looking woman draped in a plush crimson robe, sitting in a chair in front of a table. On the opposite side of the table was another woman dressed in everyday clothing staring back at her. That’s it.
As it turns out, the woman in the robe was Marina Abramović and the other woman was a fellow museum patron who had signed up to be apart of the “interactive” performance piece. I remember standing there for a moment, watching these two have a staring contest and I felt this overwhelming sense of irritation ( possibly anger?) because I just didn’t “get” it. Which made me feel stupid, especially when I glanced around to see other spectators sketching, writing, and discussing what they were viewing in hushed tones. I felt like some very obvious message had just flown over my head. I had the sudden urge to jump on that table, yank Marina by her braid and scream at her, ” WHY ARE YOU DOING THIS!?”. I wanted to slap her sullen face and tell her to stop taking herself so seriously. I wanted to know what made her sitting in a chair so fucking brilliant. If I were to sit in a chair all day, the only response I would get would be a kick in the ass and a yell to get back to work. As I stood there, watching this thing that was clearly beyond my comprehension, I was reminded of the ” Tampons in teacups” scene from Ghost World. This only irritated me more.

Later on, after we had seen the Tim Burton section, we came across the entrance of Marina’s exhibit. My friend’s and boyfriend, having their curiosity piqued decided to check it out. I chose to stay behind. And no, it had nothing to do with the use of nude models. I have no problem with that. What I did, and do have a problem with is not understanding what the fuck is going on. There is nothing that I hate more, than feeling stupid. Now, most people would say, the only way to understand something is to experience it, to investigate it. 99% of the time that is true. But not this time, at least not for me. I knew if I stepped through that entryway, I would be confronted by various forms of “staring contests” that I just wouldn’t “get”. As it turns out, I was right.

When my boyfriend came out, he asked me to step over to the entryway, where a television screen was displayed. On the screen was a video of Marina violently combing her hair. I’m sorry, but for lack of a better response, all I could think of was WHAT THE FUCK?!. What is so “artistic” about watching someone bash their head in with a comb? It’s nothing that I couldn’t do,( god know’s I already have pulled masochistic shit like that…)
My boyfriend will argue that that’s precisely the point. That it’s art because the artist made it so and that everyone is an artist whether they know it or not. Call me narrow-minded in the world of creativity, but I need to be able to wrap my head around it in order to enjoy it as artistic expression. Now, I am aware that this is merely my opinion and I have no authority over anything when it comes to the art world. Marina Abramović is an artist because she says she is, her work just happens to make me feel so offensively simple-minded that my only reaction to it is to get angry. Because goddamn it, I’m not an idiot, why the fuck can’t I “get” it?

Perhaps that was Marina Abramovic’s point all along. Art is meant to evoke a response right? My response was to feel angry and frustrated. The artist was present whether I wanted her to be or not. My anger altered the experience of the art, thus making me part of the art, thus making me the artist as well. Perhaps I was more present than I realized.

It still irritated the fuck out of me.

shutter island needs bobby miller

yes it was creepy and freaky and suspenseful ( though i’m not sure that means anything coming from me ‘cause i scare VERY easily) my problem with this movie is that when you take away the creep factor, it is very similar to three other movies i have seen in recent years. i knew the ending long before it happened and was disappointed when i turned out to be right. i am so sick of recycled movies ( there are a few remakes i have liked or will see but not many) doesn’t anyone have any new shit out there? I know, I know, “there are no original ideas…” fuck that, that’s an excuse for laziness, even if the idea isn’t original you could at least try twist it up a bit.

Anyone who knows/follows Bobby Miller knows about his short film TUB which made it all the fucking way to Sundance. I haven’t seen it yet but it’s about this guy that jerks off in his shower and ends up impregnating his tub. You can’t tell me that has already been done!

tampons in teacups

i hate art snobs. i hate it when someone puts something out there as an expression of themselves, or an expression of nothing and it gets snubbed because it doesn’t fit into a certain criteria, uh… I thought the beauty of art was that it has no rules, it’s relative, it’s open ended, it’s whatever you want it to be and whatever you don’t want it to be, it’s something different to every person that views it. So you went to fucking art school, that just tells me you paid thousands of dollars to learn how to color outside the lines ( mind you this is not directed towards all art students just the ones that hold the false belief that in being an art student they are now part of some cultured elite that decides what is considered expression and what is not) shut the fuck up and get back to paying off your student loans or sell your soul to corporate advertising. now excuse me i have to finish my toe nail clipping mosaic.