Why My Studio (and the Puppy) is Coated in White Dust

The gallery owner from Montana will arrive at The Event’s studio today (like, right NOW) to decide what naked raku pieces he will be taking to Livingston. He actually saw the work a week or so ago, before I had seen anything fired, and from the smoke The Event is blowing up my ass, he really liked my stuff. I’ve been cranking out pots this week in order that he might have a strong group to choose from. Last Friday I went to The Event’s studio to snap some shots of finished work and see how they came out, but my camera battery claimed exhaustion after three photos.

Anyway, here are two shots I managed before the camera curled up in its beddy-bye basket to make mimis:

  

That second one was my first experiment with shading, which basically means I brush down layers of the glaze that I am etching as I work (It turns into a powder that is finer than dust, and I’m not exaggerating in terms of how much white shit there is on everything in my studio, animate and inanimate alike). I’m really happy with it, and expect that it will soon be on its way to Montana. I will be going to photograph the rest of them tonight (with a well rested and quite refreshed camera) as well as to hear about what was selected and any feedback concerning my work. Given the way things have been going, I really hope it’s positive, glowing feedback.

The Battered Ego as Contained by an Aging Body

Yeesh. I am not lying when I say that my whores? They have been moaning a lot lately. It’s that joyous late 30s shift as my body struggles to straddle the fence between havin’ babies and shutting down the baby factory. At this point, I pretty much feel that my body is sending the message that I could have more babies, but damn, it wouldn’t be pretty. Which, by the way, is fine—I am firmly out of the baby business. BUT, I am noticing a significant loss of youthfulness. My way of physical sloth is revealing itself as I age. Shit’s sagging around these parts, the hair is gray, the underarms wiggle and waggle disturbingly when I wave (hello or goodbye, it doesn’t matter, and yes, that’s research I’ve engaged in). Suddenly I’m wondering if I shouldn’t start buying clothes in the grown up lady department instead of the juniors. I even ordered a swimsuit from the “swimdress” section of Newport News, and found that unless the “dress” part of the swimdress is brushing my knees, it’s not really helping anything–but damn, the built in “Shape F/X” makes it hard to breathe. (I suspect that all the fat squeezed by the F/X promptly shifts down to my thighs, which, in case anyone from Newport News is reading this, doesn’t seem to much help the self-confidence situation).

I’m aging. I’m having a hard time with a kid. Marriage is hard work.

This past weekend, we went to a big shindig at the home of sgt gennimcmahon’s boss. This boss, he made a lot of money as a financial guy, so he doesn’t really *have* to work. As we stood in the room with the indoor pool (bigger than our house), and his perfectly stunning wife welcomed us in her very short dress that topped her very fabulous legs (no children, over 40, breast cancer survivor–in the way they might make a Breast Cancer Barbie) I felt even more goofy that I had after the 17,000 outfits I had tried on prior to arriving and thanked the good dog that I hadn’t gone with the shorter skirt. After all, my streaky fake baked “natural glow” (natural only in the way that, say, jaundice is natural) and calloused feet and wide ass were plenty to contend with under normal circumstances. It was not a relaxing sort of party, because what with the dazzling wealth and the open bar and the band and, yeah, the pool (from which one could watch the horses), it included a veritable small town Who’s Who. Sgt gennimcmahon is a civil servant, so when the grossly obese politician hugs me and says, “Yer mah buddy, arencha dear?” I have to smile and say yes. I have to nod and be polite about the troubles some developer’s very decorative wife is having with finding a good, private, Christian school.

It’s not fun in that way that fun is usually fun.

As it turned out, The Event and Still Water were there, which was lovely, they were convincing a couple we know to come see some of my pottery at The Event’s studio. This couple is one that I would swear on a stack of bibles is married so that no one need question their straightness when, seriously, these two people are NOT gettin’ busy unless he’s pretending to be even more effeminite to her Butch. We went to a party at their home once and since then, she’s managed to snub me or “forget” who I am half a dozen times. We will pretend that she is just that intimidated by me. I had even complimented her on her Spam earrings (there’s a museum and they sell jewelry, who knew?) at her party, and she doesn’t know that I spent part of the time in the kitchen with a tiny crab leg hanging out of my mouth because I was intimidated by the tiny crab leg appetizers. When The Event brought us together she had to cover her snobbery (although women in Talbot’s “comfort” clothes, give me a break, snobbery is your only defense when you’re wearing pastel plaid campshirts and coordinating melon pedal pushers) by saying, “You change your hair so much that I just never recognize you–but of course your tattoo is how I know it’s you!” Whoops, just gave yourself away, sister, since the tattoo is always with me–not like I can leave IT at home.

The Event has been on this tear that Still Water wants to give me drawing lessons, which I had ignored largely because The Event, he’s excitable, and Dude, I can draw already, okay? It didn’t occur to me that at this party, that subject might come up again. Ah, but it did, and it was Still Water who asked if I wanted lessons, and I said, well, you know…..and she said that she really thinks I have talent, but I could really go a lot further with better drawings skills….Or, was I happy with my work as is? To which I said that of course one is never entirely finished learning, so, well, unless I’m dead I’m not figuring I’ve reached my zenith or anything, and somehow now I’m going to have some lessons.

That this wounds my ego is strictly, STRICTLY my problem. Because I am speaking truly when I say that I could always learn more, I could always get better. I think that this is being offered to me because they see talent, they wish to foster talent, and they think they can help. It’s just, you know, I’d really like to be the sort of fantastic, amazing talent who is already drawing rings (perfectly shaded and balanced) around everyone else in the world. In which case, of course, I wouldn’t be making pots for craft fairs, now would I? I certainly wouldn’t be making purses. I have, often, wished I had stronger technical skills, that when I wanted to draw something I just could–that the drawing of something wouldn’t be the hardest and most consuming part of the process and that I would end up with something that was just like I wanted it, not an approximation. So, I can suck it up and take drawing lessons and keep my fragile ego out of it.

It will come as a shock to no one, I hope, that I am human. After the disaster with that wretched gallery owner, I was delighted to find that I didn’t take it at all personally. I’ve got plans for three shows in the fall, all of whom are juried, and I’ve been confident that acceptance to them is a non-issue. Two of them were suggested to me by The Event, and I’ve been accepted to the least discriminating of those already. The other was a show in El Paso, and I paid a measly five bucks to submit three images to the jury. I was surprised, then, to find that they had rejected me via a letter that arrived today. As I was pondering that, The Event called, asking if I’d gotten my letter, how we needed to decide where to put our booths, and I said, well, see, they shot me down. To his credit, The Event was shocked. He apologized for getting in when I did not, and came over to give me a pep talk. I realize that there are plenty of reasons, not related to my work, as to why they didn’t take me. Somebody’s BFF might make purses from the asses of used jeans, and so they didn’t want to lose all their business to me. Or, I might be so fucking talented that I’ll make everyone else there look bad, right?

But it all just leaves me feeling like shit. The hard stuff that is happening right now–parenting challenges, marital challenges, therapy and self-improvement–that’s plenty. When the things I usually fall back on (”I’m a good artist” “I’m a fantastic purse maker” “I have mad sewing skills” “I’m attractive and youthful looking” “I’m not a Freak”) start to shift on me, damn.  I don’t need a letter telling me they don’t want my stinkin’ purses. I don’t need reminding that I could draw better.

The world doesn’t really care what we feel up for, though, so this is a point where I need to learn how to manage my ego so that I can be more resilient. Resilience is something I’m going to need a lot of, especially since there is still the really seriously juried show to apply to, and I’m going to be a parent for the rest of the forseeable future, and I would like to remain married. 

A Buffet-Style Post, Where Things are More Related Than You Might Think

This is a catching up post. There are things I want to talk about, but I don’t know how much sense they will make to anyone other than me. It’s like eating at Furr’s, if you are like me you get fried okra, macaroni and cheese, fried fish and lemon meringue pie and call it a meal while other people regard you in horror. But it’s Furr’s, and what you like is your own private business, and no one else has to eat it. So, if you don’t get it, that’s okay. There’s a salad bar and a sundae machine around here somewhere to occupy you.  

That said, I’m behind in scanning artwork, but here is the most recent to be added to the computer memory banks:

  It goes with the series of art I’ve been putting up over the past months, and will be exhibited in December at a group show at the home of The Event. The theme of loss and grief, tears and oceans is one I’m not yet finished with, and it is still closely tied to -Ray and Ruby’s deaths. I’m sure that someday I’ll be done with that process, but not yet, and not now.

So many things spin forth from what happened to my dearest sister-friend and her child, things predictable and things surprising. Recently, I wore a skirt that was -Ray’s. I had reinforced the seams several times, as it was composed of a rayon/linen blend and that is a fragile fabric. Painted on the skirt was a dinosaur. I sat down at the computer that day and the back seam popped and split. I remembered -Ray telling me about the skirt, and had found a business card amongst her things that I *thought* belonged to the artist who painted that fanciful creature on it. I emailed her. She emailed back.

After two emails the pieces fell into place and I realized that she wasn’t just someone who had met -Ray, she was someone who was very tied to her, had been close friends with her, and was left bereft and confused and staring into a void of unknown when they died. I was able to fill Lissie in on what I have pieced together, and she provided information to me, as well. I knew John had “Sent some people away who think they are friends but aren’t” and I had wondered—who was it that he severed ties with during that week as he isolated his family unto his own muderous heart? I know now that Lissie and her husband were among them, suddenly getting an email saying that they had never been liked, to never approach them, to stay away. I tried to provide some perspective for her–it wasn’t anything they had done; it was John’s need to keep anyone from figuring out what he intended to do, to keep people away from Ray who might reach out and help and prevent his actions.

Lissie and I found that the universe lined up and somehow -Ray worked through us. Lissie is an artist, and she makes jewelry. She offered to give me a piece, and I agreed only if she would accept a purse. We each unknowingly selected the very item that the other had secretly chosen for them. I sent Lissie a card that featured a print of a fairy, and she told me that she and Ray each had a framed copy of that print in their houses. She thanked me for being “the keeper of the puzzle” and for whatever reason that struck me and I realized that I have taken on that role, and I’m glad that what I’ve carefully assembled over months of thought has functioned to help someone else deal with what happened. We are glimpses of our dear friend for each other, and I treasure that and tuck it away into my heart.

This theme of loss that I grapple with-that has become part of what I do with my life-includes my own fears about loss of myself. I have always harbored a tremendous and crippling fear of my own death, and so because I have the therapist who pulls no punches, we have been dealing with that in a way that leaves me in a fetal position, being swept out to the parking lot until next week. My own fears concerning what constitutes “I” and what is “life” and what is meant by “death” are now inextricably wound up in -Ray, in what happened, in whether or not she knew, and what she knew, in what she might know now or where she might be. Her mother believes that Ray, who died after Ruby and John, didn’t let go until when, in the ambulance, she heard them pronounce Ruby. She was never conscious, and I pick away at that, wondering, how did she know? DID she know?

This weekend I had a tiny experience that while not of much consequence served to further illuminate the murky concerns of mortality. We had gone to an opening at the gallery and while I was talking to someone, the fingers of my right hand went completely numb. I felt weird, as well, regarding my sand-filled digits with detachment, “Hmmm. This is bad. Well, better not let on, I’ll keep trying to move them…hmmmm.” Then my vision went a little funny. These are both symptoms of migraine, and I have those sorts of migraines every few years or so. But then, the vision thing righted itself. We left the gallery, and as we got into the van I mentioned the events to sgt. gennimcmahon “just in case.” I suspect I was not thinking so straight at the time.

We drove about, looking for somewhere to eat. One of the kids said, “How about the place we went with The Event that time?” And I said, “Who’s The Event?” Everyone in the car suddenly looked at me. Sgt. gennimcmahon put his hand on my hand and said, “Honey? The Event and Still Water? THE EVENT?” and I said, “I’ve met them? I know them?” Which earned me a trip to the ER, pronto. The children were dropped at home, money for pizza was flung on the table and sgt. gennimcmahon zipped me back across town to the hospital. All the way there asking me, “What day is it?” “Who am I?” (I knew all the answers, by the way, it was a short-lived little brain problem).

The ER part of this is not the point, and it did turn out to most likely be a weird migraine. But the abrupt forgetting of a major part of my life; that was somehow very shocking to me and to sgt gennimcmahon  It was one of those messages from mortality that you might just punch your ticket any old time, and there won’t be any warning. You might stop being YOU, and it might happen before you have time to realize it. I knew that I should know who they were talking about. And as they kept mentioning things to get me to catch up, I was trying to put those things together, “The Event….the pottery, naked raku…what is that? I should know this, but EVENT? Oh, smile and pretend, you should know this, look, they are freaking out here…”

I’m so concerned about the ME that must be in there; is there a core of me-ness that doesn’t go away even when I reach the point of ultimate forgetting? Am I in there?  If I am leaving and I don’t know it, how will I save anything to remember me by? This is why I don’t sleep well; it’s an endless circuit that runs through my brain. I have an absolute horror of dying in my sleep for that very reason.

Yet, I believe that Ray; some aspect of her that is real, worked through the universe to bring me and Lissie together at the exact moment it happened. I believe that the connections were made for a reason. And so I hope that even if I get switched off before I’m ready, that whatever is the essential aspect of me will remain. Just like I know exactly where I was and what I was thinking when I had no idea who The Event was. I knew that wasn’t right, even if I was pretty altered at the time it happened. Mainly I was sort of lost in my head, like when I’ve been given narcotics, and my mind is just babbling away, but if I open my mouth nothing intelligible comes out. My mind was saying, “Wow, something is really wrong here, seriously, this is not good, you should really say something about this, and quickly.” But it didn’t come out of my mouth.

I feel somewhat embarrassed that this small thing–a mundane headache, really–seems like a big enough deal to post about. But I do think things happen for a reason, and appropriately or not, it definitely tripped something related to a larger set of issues in my life right now. I think we all have experiences like that, and I can’t help how much it struck me. I’m an organized person, I like for the pieces to fit into the puzzle—I will worry with it until it does, or I pass out after three days without sleep. So that’s that–this is where I’m at today, this week, right now. Wondering, changed, seeking. But also grateful for Lissie. Grateful for sgt. gennimcmahon who did not wait for me to tell him that things might not be okay and who did not agree with me that we should bail on the ER once it seemed like there might be a wait and who even looked up the symptoms of a stroke on his PDA and then showed it to an impassive receptionist. These are all pieces of a puzzle so big I can’t even determine what the final picture will be, but I have to keep putting the pieces together anyway. Like a giant mandala, perhaps, it seems important.

 

 

Let’s Talk About How Unhappy This Makes Me

So, over Spring Break (the fated trip with the inlaws) I mentioned that I went into a gallery in Bisbee, Arizona and showed the owner a bin of purses. She took all of them on consignment, and we signed a contract for three months. That was on March 27, 2008. Today  I arrived home to find a beat up box at the front door. Inside, I found over $650 worth of my bags crammed together with only tissue paper between them, a note from the gallery owner saying she had changed her store and my bags no longer “fit,” and my share of the only sale she made–a checkbook cover–IN CASH, with the coins TAPED TO A PIECE OF PAPER.

Now, I’m a grown up and I’m a professional. That means that I can read and comprehend contracts and I try really hard to avoid being an asshole. So, I understand that the gallery owner has violated the contract by severing it without even contacting me. Not that I would have argued had she called me up and said that she no longer wanted the bags–after all, if her clientele aren’t into me, I need my bags back so I can sell them to the more appreciative folks. Worse, she damaged and possibly ruined several bags. Look here, just look, can you believe it?

                 

  

It may be hard to see in the thumbnails, but basically all my bags are shaped. These bags? These bags are smashed. Flat. There’s a lot of ironing to come, a lot of steaming, and couple of them may not be fixable. If there is one thing (ONE THING I shout) I pride myself on, it’s being a professional. I am pretty confident that this has nothing to do with my bags and has everything to do with money troubles on the part of the gallery. Gee, I wonder why, huh?

I am writing a very stern letter. Dammit. My iron isn’t the only thing steaming around here.

Naked (cue giggles) Raku

I mentioned in this post that my work was purchased by a local couple who are, amongst many other things, art collectors. I met the Mr. of this couple first, and he is hardly a person so much as he is an event. He’s one of those fascinating and colorful sorts who is always in motion. He’s charismatic, forthright and a talented potter. The first time we met was at the gallery, and he came in without noticing me at all, accompanied by a dog. This dog travels with him wherever he goes, because this dog has a job, and his job is to keep an eye on The Event. The Event begins talking to someone else, animatedly, and then stops mid-sentence and says to me, “Who are you?” I gave him my name and the other person started telling him about my work at the gallery, to which I lamely added that I make purses. “Like that one? Can you make one with chickens? Still Water* (his wife) loves chickens, her birthday’s in a month, can you make that?” I said, “Yes.” He said, “By then?” I said, “Absolutely,” and he said, “I love this woman; what I want she can do!” One thing led to another, and three purses and two pieces of art later, he came over with a box full of pottery.

“Here’s the deal,” he said, “I make these pots; you know what Raku is?” I said yes. He said, “You know what Naked Raku is?” The smallest of the fries giggled (and giggled everytime thereafter that it was mentioned). I said no. He showed me some pots that looked like this:

The contribution of the artist (as in the one above, which is not my work) is to etch a design into that window portion, and upon firing, the etched portion turns black. One of the things I really appreciate about The Event is that he is very straightforward and clear, which makes true collaboration possible. He said, “I’m not an artist. I don’t how you guys do this, I don’t want to know how, I just want you to see what you think and if they sell, we’re in business.”  He has worked with two artists previously; one tried to screw him over (so I’ve heard) and is no longer on the team. He since has recruited me and my Spiritual Mother (my art teacher from high school who is my neighbor and the gallery partner getting shafted by the rich partner in the gallery closing). My qualifications in his opinion are not just artistic, but that I deliver things when I say I will; an uncommon trait in an artist. I have this thing about deadlines and such, and I’m very efficient and prompt–it’s that I’m equally left and right brained, which is sometimes good and sometimes bad.

Anyway, he gave me about six pieces to practice on. This is the first one I did:

   If you embiggen, at the bottom, you can see that the wave gets a bit over-worked; I hadn’t mastered the technique yet. However, The Event was beside himself. While it’s not a “keeper,” I’m the first artist he’s worked with to achieve a workable design on the first try. My second one wasn’t a keeper, either, but had good elements. The third and fourth fired poorly, which turned out to be his fault and not mine. The fifth one, though, that’s where it all came together and we got the first keeper:

  

It began like this:

 This one is dipped, so then I take dental tools and carefully etch the design into it. I generally draw it on freehand, then start chipping and carving. Prior to firing, it’s a white on off-white appearance, which interestingly gives less of an idea as to how it will look fired than you might think. There are a lot of variables. One is that I have to be prepared for a section to loosen and fall off, so I can’t be too dependent on symmetry–I’ve figured a way to work with that and incorporate it for a more organic feel in the final piece. It’s either that or cry, so, one does what one can. Another is that you never know how the crackling will happen. The first bowl with the lotus didn’t crackle much, making it less interesting than the first keeper with the chrysanthemum design that crackled significantly.

My mother wanted to buy the first keeper sight unseen, but I have decided that I will instead give it to her for Mother’s Day. My portion of the work takes me about an hour per pot, and I expect to get faster as I go. My “cut” from each will range from about $30 if it’s sold from The Event’s table at a craft show to $50-60 for pieces sold in galleries. Gallery pieces are priced between $175-250, with the gallery getting 40-50% and my piece being 40% of The Event’s commission–more than fair for an hour’s work on my part. The first keeper is special, certainly, because it’s the first, and while I’ll get better and better, I’m really pleased with how quickly I’ve picked this up–and The Event predicts a beautiful friendship. My mom will love it, I’ll get to visit it when I want, and so it’s a win-win.

As of right now, I will be receiving 15 large orbs (like the first pot I showed you up there) next Monday, then 15 bowls a week later. I go on Saturday to tell The Event how I want them taped, and then once they are in my hot little hands they need to be turned around and ready to fire by the end of the month. It’s not a lot of time, but I’m looking forward to it. I like having an assignment, and it’s a totally different process than purse making. We’ll see what happens, and I apologize to those I’ve bored with a long post on pot. Sorry, on POTS. I’ll be sure to take pictures, and I update Flickr weekly, so you can always check there, too.

*Truly, she is his complement, and I liked him immensely right away because The Event is always in search of presents for Still Water. It’s his job, just like it’s the dog’s job to watch The Event, and my Leo heart just loves that in a person.

Conversations with (White) Feminism, Pt. 1

Narrator (in what one hopes is a sexually ambiguous voice): It is early evening at Casa de gennimcmahon. gennimcmahon has just returned from work, (White) Feminism [(W) Fem] has also just returned home from a day of rabble rousing.

(W) Fem (approvingly): Nice Birks—guess you find those more comfortable than the patriarchally [(W) Fem doesn't give a fuck about spelling because spelling is a power structured game to prove that men are smarter than women, because they decided how things should be spelled in the first place and who says they have the final say, anway?] approved heels, huh?

gennimcmahon: Yeah, I have to say I do notice women in heels more now, and they look like they can’t walk properly. Then I imagine a giant dragon attacking the city and whoo! Those girls don’t stand a CHANCE.

(W) Fem: (glaring at gennimcmahon’s toes) Too bad you felt the need to make your FEET “prettier” with the polish. That has Formaldehyde in it, yanno.

gennimcmahon: Actually, this stuff is some organic shit I bought at (mumbles) walmart and I don’t care about pretty so much as I care that I have fungal nails and they’re disgusting looking.

(W) Fem: OH, how socially conscious of you, buying your non-chemical death nail polish from the Great Satan. You know they don’t promote women there, doncha? And you only have fungus because you bought into the idea that your feet are naturally un-feminine and exploited some poor Asian woman and made her give you a pedicure.

gennimcmahon:  (reciting in monotone) And she sure got me back with the fungus, huh, I’m sure a dirty American pig dog now.

(W) Fem: Did you read the spinster aunt about that poor woman who is being discriminated against for her art? Can you believe that? The patriarchy just wants to control everything about a woman’s body and remind everyone that women are disgusting and repulsive and have no right to like themselves. We’re thinkin’ of having a protest, and we’ll write all the signs with menstrual blood, wanna come?

gennimcmahon: Uh, A) What is wrong with you? and B) Sorry, I’m not having my period right now. No, thank you, I wouldn’t want you to run out.

(W) Fem: What? It’s ART, you should understand that, you’re an ARTIST, right? She’s making a point, hell, SHE didn’t even think it would be that controversial, she had no idea how crazy the woman-hating machine would go about it. She wanted to start a conversation!

gennimcmahon: Are you so far up your own ass that you can’t see or hear? Are you? Are you so privileged with your approved footwear and vegan anesthetized fiber pants and “no-BJs” tshirt and your short hair and the lipstick cops that you actually think you are required to take that seriously?

(W) Fem: (sulking) YOU have short hair.

gennimcmahon: And I dye it funky colors and I don’t tell other people what to do with their hair and I think the female clerk at Walgreen’s with the mustache and lip piercing is hot, oh, and WTF does that have to do with, say, Coltran and corporate rape and mutilation of women and children? Or, how about the government charging into that religious compound where they suspect the men are raping children and LEAVING THE MEN THERE while they take the children away from their MOTHERS? Hello?

(W) Fem: Well, they’re oppressing her! They’re telling her it’s disgusting that she menstruates! But, well, huh….you’re right, they should’ve taken the men away from the women and children, that’s, HEY! QUIT changing the subject, that poor undergrad is being discriminated against, it’s not fair!

gennimcmahon: Listen, you and I? We’ve been living together for a long time. I’ve opened my mind and raised my consciousness and changed my frame of reference, hell I have to send you to the store just to enjoy sex anymore, okay? I use a DIVA CUP, so don’t give me that internalized hatred of the female body shtick, because I’ve got my hands all over the female aspects,okay?  But this? THIS IS SIMPLY STUPID. It isn’t worth mentioning, it isn’t worth talking about, and it certainly isn’t ANYTHING other than some privileged undergrad’s way of saying she has major angst and is hoping to avoid ever having to work for a living. It’s NOT A FEMINIST ISSUE. Oh, and, it’s also not an anti-feminist issue, because, see, it’s too goddamned stupid to be any sort of issue beyond the question of whether or not universities are in the business of encouraging people to be utterly worthless.

(W) Fem: (blinking back tears, not that there’s anything wrong with crying, and it is NOT a sign of weakness, and whatever Hillary did that time, it wasn’t really CRYING, it’s not crying unless you get snot on your face) What? Why you gotta hate on me like that?

gennimcmahon: I *don’t* hate you. I hate how ridiculous you sound when your head is so far up your ass all you can see is the inside of your own belly button. I hate how you can give so much time and attention to things that are only issues for those privileged enough to view their own belly buttons from the same lens. I hate how you are so desperate to separate yourself from WOC that you will run around acting like the biggest issue facing feminists is that SOME OF US STILL WEAR MASCARA. Because the last time I checked, it didn’t matter to the HIV-Positive guys in the Congo if the woman they raped was wearing make up or heels, or if the child whose arm they cut off was wearing organic cotton. GIVE ME A MOTHERFUCKING BREAK, (W) FEM!

(W) Fem: You send me to the store so you can enjoy sex?

gennimcmahon: Yes. Actually, remember the weekend I sent you to the womyn’s herstory conference?

(W) Fem: (warily) Yeah….it was great, I remember you said you couldn’t go because you had to do some research on, on, ON PRIMATE BEHAVIOR!!!! YOU GOT A HOTEL ROOM AND….AND….AND….I.Am.Shocked.

gennimcmahon: Did I tell you there’s a conference coming up next weekend? It’s all about the beauty of body hair. C’mon, you know you wanna go, huh? Vegan towels….no make up allowed…..c’mon, they’re going to take an oath and swear to commit to a non meat, non grain, cruelty-free lifestyle (there’s an exception for horse ownership, which is Different). They’ll have Earth Shoes for half price……

(W) Fem: Okay, I guess…..but, will it be at a nicer hotel? At the last one, that maid looked really shady, I didn’t feel like my stuff was safe in the room….you know how they are….

gennimcmahon: Do you smell anything? I smell something; it’s a bit, uh, “irony”….it’s….oh, right, it’s YOUR PERIOD.

SEXUALLY AMBIGUOUS NARRATOR: gennimcmahon recognizes that in expressing her opinon on this issue, she is wading into waters far deeper than her swimming abilities and that her very presence in this very water may well lead to speculation as to her qualifications. However, while gennimcmahon readily admits that she can’t possibly read every blog and every comment on every blog and every article and all that, she does feel she’s qualified in that she HAS A VAGINA and is therefore, no matter what the length of her hair, the color of her toes or her personal opinion about BJs, qualified to at least float around a bit on a brightly colored raft, so move over, bitches, and pass the margaritas.

Also, gennimcmahon credits Ilyka, who in turn credits like, the whole WOC blogsphere (whom I don’t know well, or I’d list them, but then I’d leave someone out and fuck that up, too, remember I’m not a strong swimmer), because they have been trying to get us to look up from our privileged feminist navel gazing and suggest that maybe, just maybe, IT ISN’T ABOUT THE BLOW JOBS, LADIES, IT’S ABOUT THE VIOLENCE, THE DEATH, THE HORROR. I don’t care what kind of shoes you wear, but Stand the Fuck Up, already.

The Good, the Bad and the Not Freaking Out

My gallery is closing. When I say “my” I mean that the gallery at which I am a “resident artist” is closing, leaving one of the people most dear to me in the world without a job, and several artists without a place to hang their work. This was not necessarily a surprise, although many familiar with the situation had hoped that the money partner—who has so much money that they likely fart bills each time they bend over—would stop being a control freak, let those best qualified to run it do so, and keep it going a bit longer. Nothing wrong with a loss to write off when you’re a billionaire, right?

Apparently there is, and what is wrong with that in the eyes of the billionaire is that when one suddenly wants to play at being an artist and to play at being a gallery owner, one’s ego seems to cloud over the logic circuits. This results in tantrums and micro-managing despite all evidence pointing to the fact that perhaps you should be the silent partner and let the experts manage the working end of it. So you close it up, give someone (who retired from a full time job to run the place) short notice, and bail out. After all, there are plenty of spas at which to tend to any messy, lingering feelings of guilt.

The upshot being that my decision to do the walk in Bisbee, Arizona  during the great Spring Break adventure in agony was even more astute than I realized. I at least now have a place for some of my handbags, and Twist seems an excellent fit for my craft. Now I have to figure out how on earth I’ll go about finding a place for the drawings, which is far more problematic both in terms of my own artistic confidence and lack of familiarity with potential galleries. It’s one thing to get some doodles in a local gallery managed by someone whom I’ve known since I was 15 years old and quite another to present them to a gallery where the artists are formally trained and technically gifted.

For the time being, as I work toward the 1-3 craft shows I will be participating in this Fall, I will focus on purse-making, while at the same time continuing to work on art daily to prepare for an art show in December at the home of a local arts patron who has, in the past month, commissioned four purses, purchased two drawings and an art bag from the gallery, and asked me to participate in a collaborative project in which I (with two other artists) will be etching pottery to be placed in a gallery in Montana and sold for about $175-250 apiece. That show may well define what the next step is for me as an artist.

What I’m not going to do is give up. I have goals, and they include having all my work—art and craft alike—in a few galleries and shows, and leave the weekly peddling behind. Things have steadily fallen into place as I have committed myself to the plan and let go of the inner critics that stifled me for so many years. I am fairly sure that as long as I remain open to the universe, the doors of the universe will remain open as well, even if the physical doors of the local gallery are closing. That’s all quite woo-woo, but I honestly feel that my mindset is the key to making the works of the universe turn, so I will continue to apply my labor and see where it takes me.

Protected: Siege Ended. For Now.

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Art!

I swear, coming up with a title is the worst part of putting up a new post. The sheer volume (”volume” being an entirely relative concept) of work I’ve produced since the beginning of the year is, for me, like an entire lifetime of work. I’m typically slow, given to large, involved and deeply detailed pieces that are researched like a dissertation and end up either never getting finished or somehow missing the mark in their over-complexity. Making myself work more quickly and instinctively, with very little poring over my dictionary of reverse symbolism (yes, there is such a thing, and I have two copies because it’s probably my most utilized book). This process forces me to be less literal, which I think is causing my work to be far more effective in terms of what a viewer gets from the experience.

This much work has also justified a purchase—this (I can’t find a great link, but I got the Premiere 156 Set from dick blick–yeah, 156 markers–Heaven!). I got a great deal, and at this point I feel it’s okay to buy the set. Nearly 16 years ago, as a single-welfare-mother attending school full-time and raising two small children, I took what seemed like a huge risk and spent a portion of my student loan disbursement on the 120 set of Prismacolor Colored Pencils. I still have them, plus some that belonged to my grandfather (we disregard the taint of who he was and simply marvel at their age and longevity, thank you).

I’m not one to decide that I might like a new hobby and then rush out and spend a jillion dollars on equipment/accessories before I’ve even really tried it. I sewed with a cheap Brother sewing machine (the $89 one from Walmart) for nearly seven years, replacing it only when I finally managed to actually burn out the plastic gears. I replaced it with a used White, which weighed about 7,000 lbs but had metal gears that couldn’t be ruined. I sewed with it for another five years before my mother bought me a really, really great and (to me) very expensive Husqvarna Viking, which at the time was still the second cheapest model they had. I’ve had it for nearly six years now, and wouldn’t trade it for the world.

I tend to hold a healthy disdain for people who get up one day and announce that they are going to start bicycling and then go blow $6000 at the bike shop on a bike and silly shorts that they use a few times and then hide in the shed when they realize that this isn’t really for them. Entire industries are based on that idea that in order to even begin to do something, you  have to have the top-of-the-line everything. I strive to teach my students that sewing needn’t be a tremendously expensive undertaking–particularly not at first. That’s why we make duct-tape dress forms and watch sales and re-use elements of old clothes. I think they’re freer to learn and experiment when they don’t feel they’ve just spent a heap of money (theirs or their parents) on something. That’s too much pressure—who can create and learn to make mistakes without fear if they’re sweating the cost of everything?

This is a long way of saying that I have wanted that set of markers for YEARS, and I’m glad that I waited until now to get them. Because I know I’ll use them just about every single day, I know I can sell my work, and so it seems to be the right time to invest. Because it’s something that exists, not something I’m imagining that I think will be just great to do.

Without further rambling, here’s the latest from my nightly endeavors:

I got a bit more detailed than I’ve been in previous pieces, utilizing a device from earlier works (many unfinished) in adding the tangled roots. As always, I’m absolutely nuts about this one, love it more than anything else (except the one of -Ray) and can’t wait to see what I’ll do next. Finishing things is so new to me that I spend part of each evening thumbing through my manila folder full of art. Who knew that would feel so much better than a zillion half-completed and then abandoned works? Or the one or two that have been signed like this: “Guenevere 1996-1999.”

Just for grins, here’s how well this one goes with the other most recent works:

       

Holy crap, Batman, I’ve got a series going. This was the best New Year’s resolution I’ve ever made.

A Little Capitalism Never Hurt Anyone

I’m going to make a go of it on etsy, so if you hanker for a bag, check back during this week as I list more items. Right now I have two lonely items for sale, because once I finished battling phucking photoshop elements over the banner, I was too tired to do much more.

And, no, I don’t like my stinking banner. UPDATED: Now I have changed it, and it totally rocks. But I’m delighted that the universe parted the veils for me and pointed out that the reason the gallery didn’t want my octopus girl was because, OBVIOUSLY, she is my purse-making logo. I’m slow sometimes. She’s already been part of a new label design, but because someone in my family lived through the Great Depression and I drink from that gene pool, new marketing tools will not be used until the old ones run out.