Sunday, August 26, 2007
The Color Green
The JohnnyB is back from vacation.
Since he spent most of it being seriously sick, he obviously had a lot of time to contemplate some serious life issues.
One of them is reducing carbon footprint by, like, not eating.
Kinda.
So, drop that bag of chips, put away that beer (yes, you!) and go read it!
.
Labels: Food, Nature, Ode to other blogs, People
Thursday, August 23, 2007
See Under: HAPPY
Remember my great-nephew Tal, the little tongue-sticking mate of The JohnnyB's?
Well, about 2.5 months have passed, and I just got an updated photo of him.
He's been busy during that time: got himself some nice tan, grew some hair, lost a chin or two, learned to sit, and is obviously in complete bliss about the world in general.
As we say in my family: "Eize Shosho!"
Tuesday, August 21, 2007
A Little Lunch For Thought (TM) #9
Had my annual date with my optometrist today. A very sweet and professional one, whose room is a blessed haven where Hebrew is spoken, which is a highly appreciated rest for my tongue.
Once the discussion on our befuddling new insurance was over, I was taken into the examination chambers. There they were, awaiting my shortsighted eyes, the various machines of torture, which shall determine the fate of my eyes this year. The one that makes you repeat meaningless lines of letters (reminded me of the word verification when posting a comment on a blog); the scanner that shoot a dazzling light right into your retina (still much better than those dilating drops of horror); the one that spits a puff of air into your unsuspecting eye (not sure what they check with that!), and for dessert, the fun one that tests your peripheral vision: you stare into yet another lens that has the fascinating sight of a white arid field with a tiny black square in the middle, and each time you see a blinking thingy, you are supposed to click a button. I rock at this game!Then you finally get to meet with the optometrist herself. She goes through a more thorough testing, in which we carry a profound dialogue (with poetic lines such as "this? ...or this?" "Ahm, this, I think") and exchange a lot of numbers and letters.
Then comes the scary moment in which she looks at my eye-scan results, which have green and red lumps all over and terribly-looking branching veins and the occasional shape of eyelashes (as I always blink during the scan). Each year it looks like I have all the possible eye diseases that ever existed, but after that moment of fear, she assures me nonchalantly, "OK, that looks fine".
Then I am asked to stare into her eyes through some monstrous machinery, and follow a stick with a clown sticker on it (yup, it's weird).
And then I am instructed to look at her ears.
There I am, sitting sans my contact lenses, feeling as blind as a mole, staring at her ear while all the lights in the world are being shone into my eyes - - -
- - - and for the past 5 years, each and every time I go to her, I want to ask her why.
What's with the ear?
And yet, I never do.
So tell me, why is it that when we go to a doctor, we usually hesitate to ask what we want? It's the only chance to get an answer, we have set this appointment, we pay for it - why does it feel like we need to just sit there and obey? Or am I the only one??
At least I got my year's supply of contact lenses. The number on the left eye has gone down, thank you for asking. Which is nice. But I am also gradually becoming more farsighted. Getting old is soooo much fun!
previous little lunch... ...next little lunch
Labels: Damn Technology, Little Lunch for Thought
Sunday, August 19, 2007
This Is Pathetic!
Before coming to the Land of the Free and Home of the Brave, when I was still in the Land of Milk and Honey, I was fully immersed in the hi-tech world. 4 years in the Technion led to a 9-year career as a CAD developer and a first-line manager. It was all about state of the art tools, cutting edge technologies and other catchwords.
And here I am, today, August 19th, 2007, bouncing around with bliss, just 'cause I managed to import a bunch of users to a new Emailing system.
We (as in our art organization) are sending our newsletter - and occasionally other messages - via Email.
Email, as we all know, is a wonderful way to communicate. HOWEVER, when some of the addressees are not too familiar with the world of Email ethics, big chaos follows. Some of our members have a very light finger on the SPAM. Others feel that whatever they have to say deserves an large audience. Which has inspired them to develop a long-lasting emotional relationship with the reply-all button. Which leads to a joyful domino effect of responses sent to the whole list (as everyone has to protest "why did I get this Email?" to the whole forum). Which puts everyone in a mode of over-excitement, and me into a hair-tearing state.
So, WebbieM and I (and our impoverished hair roots) have decided that no more. We need a CreativeSoul-proof solution. WebbieM has recently switched our website to SiteGround, which it is conveniently linked with PHPLists, an open-source newsletter manager, that is free to download, install and use. It provides some very helpful functionalities for sending out newsletters and messages to a large list. Above all - it sends the message to each person separately, to the vast disappointment of reply-all fetishists.
And yet, alas, as it turned out, it was not as trivial to install as we secretly hoped for.
WebbieM and myself dove into the configuration tutorial, reverted to as low as reading the user's guide (the shame!!), struggled with some of the functionally for days, and made mutual efforts to debug our testing failures. Last week, in one last effort, we managed to nail it down and figure it out to the last bit of detail. On Friday, The JohnnyB (my private Excel Guru), contributed to this
endeavor by helping me resolve some file-format issues.
And today, I decided to get over the lethal combination of stalling, procrastination, hesitance and procrastination (indeed, the recipe calls for two doses of the latter). I took the most up-to-date version of our members roster, and after some arm wrestling with the computer, managed to conquer the bloody thing. Sitting back, I watched the confirmation messages running on the screen, as tears of joy fill my eyes.
So, what is wrong with this picture?
Me, a 9-year techie, getting so much satisfaction out of a simple import of a CSV file?!?!
I guess that shows how much assimilated I've become with the world of art, and how far I have wandered from the world of formats and config files.
I have to admit: I enjoyed the intellectual duel. It was actually fun.
But, I'd rather be painting.
Labels: Damn Technology, Major Achievements
Saturday, August 18, 2007
ArtPact #27
Actually, not quite an ArtPact. Just sharing what happens when you go back to what you think was a perfectly completed work, looking it again with criticizing eyes, and thinking "Uh Oh! This is sooooooo unfinished!".
This kind of sobering up usually happens when you are just about to enter the painting into a show. And, today is the deadline for entering the annual show of the smaller organization to which I belong. That one is not Watermedia-bounded, so you can enter anything - which means I can enter my very first collage, which I did about 3 months ago.
Now, this show required you to submit photos, which will be juried. If you enter 3, you are guaranteed that at least one of them will be accepted. And, that is my top choice.
I was about to take a photo, but something about the collage kept bothering me. Echoing in my head were the words of RabkieM, LimaB and WackieM (Oh yes, I hear voices!): "You should add line work in your collages!".
I kept refusing to do so, sticking to my one-medium-only purism, but last week I decided that without it, something is indeed missing. Putting the disappointed camera aside, I took a brush, dipped it in acrylic paint, and thoroughly enjoyed adding some finishing touches.
Luckily (if not miraculously), I stopped in time. Looking at what I did, totally loving the result, I was astonished by the difference that a few lines and touches of paint here and there can make. Apparently, being brave enough to take an OK painting one step further beyond safe can improve it significantly. (of course, some times it can totally ruin it... and in art, as in life, there is no undo!).
You be the judge of this slight makeover.
Before:
And after (the title is courtesy of The JohnnyB):
"Bored Meeting", Collage on matboard, 15"x19"
Wish me luck with the juror!
previous ArtPact ... ...next ArtPact
Labels: Art, ArtPact, Major Achievements
Thursday, August 16, 2007
The 5th (Beethoven's And Ours)
Today is our fifth wedding anniversary.
Yes, The JohnnyB and I got married 5 years ago, on the nice sunny Friday of August 16th, 2002. It was the happy ending of the JohNava saga (of which I started to write here).
What are we doing to celebrate this glorious day? Hmm, nothing really...
The JohnnyB is returning this evening from a conference in Oregon, where he presented a paper he wrote, so he will probably be dead tired. And his laptop crashed during the conference, so he'll also be pissed off. We may be having an informal dinner with Scooter (who's also returning from the very same conference) and his wife and daughter. but I hear The JohnnyB has spread the joy of his sore ruby throat to Scooter, so that's probably out.
Five years. Impressive milestone. Well, it is for me. I didn't make it to five years in my first marriage, and my relationship after that has also lasted less than 5 years (due to a devastating force majeure). So this is quite an achievement.
Now, what does one post on such a day? A day that makes one think and reminisce, recall all the ups and downs, joy and frustration, smiles and grimaces that characterize a marriage, particularly a mixed marriage (and ours is mixed in almost every sense: language, mentality, culture, nationaltiy, religion, gender, character, eye-color - you name it!)?
While cleaning my overloaded mailbox yesterday (reduced it from over 500 messages to under 50!!!), I stumbled upon this movie sent to me a while ago by Amir (Thank You!!).
I think this fits the occasion perfectly, brilliantly capturing it all.
Which reminds me:
A couple of years ago, a friend asked me, "So, when you and The JohnnyB argue, do you do it in English or Hebrew?"
"Ah", I replied graciously, "but you see, we never argue!"
And with that self-delusion, I shall now take the fifth.
Labels: Birthday, Family, Major Achievements, Meta Bloggin'
Monday, August 13, 2007
The Color Purple
OK, OK, red.
I still think I have a purple soul, though.
Now what?
| What color is your soul painted? Red Your soul is painted the color red, which embodies the characteristics of love, strength, physical energy, sex, passion, courage, protection, excitement, speed, leadership, power, danger, and respect. Red is the color of the element Fire, and is associated with blood, life and death, birth, volcanoes, and intense emotions.
|
 Quizzes and Personality Tests |
Labels: It's All About Me, Meta Bloggin'
Saturday, August 11, 2007
Dining With The Admiral
JimmyB (who is the brother of The JohnnyB), won the American Bar Association Award for Best Paper on Military Law, which he wrote on Jurisdiction Over War Crimes. It's a big thing, as only one such award is given each year, to one person. For that, JimmyB flew from the East Coast all the way over to The Golden City. (which some people tend to refer to as San Francisco).
Up we went to the city, to witness the ceremony with our own admiring eyes. Took us only 30 minutes of frantic driving around to finally find a parking garage that does not require you to withdraw all your life-savings for an hour of parking. We walked into the Marriott Hotel - and were immediately surrounded by lawyers. Tall lawyers and short lawyers; wide lawyers and skinny lawyers; sly lawyers and honest lawyers (well, there have to be some, eh?); smug lawyers and, hmm, OK, only smug lawyers. All men in dark suits, all women in high heels, and a lot of military lawyers in their fancy dress uniform.
And among al that crowd, The JohnnyB and yours truly. The JohnnyB nicely dressed with a tie, and myself dressed quite decently, and still feeling very colorful among all that seriousness.
Took forever to find our way to the Armed Forces room, where they had all the uniforms. We were introduced to the people with whom JimmyB spends his daily life and we've never met. Nice people, I have to say. Now, I really suck at the art of mingling (as in, standing around and carrying pointless small talk to which nobody cares to listen and the best response you can get is "oh-how-interesting"). So, I kept myself entertained by trying to figure out and compare the different uniform colors and various ranks, and countless colored strip-thingies and pins. I even had the epiphany of why they call 'navy blue' by that name...
Apparently, we could not sit down, as the big shot uniforms were standing up, but just as I was about to break this rule, as JimmyB claimed that ladies can sit down when they want to, and, well, I'm a lady (hey, isn't anybody out there watching Little Britain? SOMEONE?? PLEASE??? ...) - we were invited to sit down. It felt like musical chairs, everyone hovering above their chairs, and then sitting to attention.
It was quite interesting for me to see how things are done in the US military (well, in the JAG), and comparing it to my military days, years ago, back in my homeland.
There was a welcome speech, followed by a moment of silence dedicated to those who gave their lives and those who are at harm's way. I swear, it was less than 20 seconds! (I guess lawyers are more efficient at remembering...). Then came one embarrassing moment, when we were asked to stand for the Pledge of Allegiance. Now, I am not a US citizen yet (still procrastinating filling those forms!), and I have no idea what to do nor what to say. So I just followed everyone, stood there like an idiot, and eventually kinda put my hand on my heart. When in Rome...
The ceremony proceeded, with an introduction of the luncheon speaker (onion soup), opening speech (chicken leg with forbidden rice), main speech, and finally - the awards! (accompanied by cheese cake on which everyone nibbled secretly during the long ceremony. For the record, I have to say that my mom would have been proud of me, as I waited till the end before taking the first bite!).
Awards were explained, then speeched, then presented, then given, and eventually came the thank-you-I-am-so-humbled-ah-you-really-shouldn't-have-no-really speeches.
Then, it was Jimmy's turn. Before giving his own speech, he said, "I was taught to keep it short or funny". Thankfully, he chose keeping it short. In fact, just before handing the award to JimmyB, the admiral also exclaimed "...and I would like to thank JimmyB's brother, John, and his sister-in-law, Naiva, who came as guests." Would have been nice to have my name pronounced the right way, for a change, but - hey, a girl can only ask for so much, eh? For the sake of JimmyB, I chose to not correct the mighty admiral in public (and those who know me will know I would have had no problem doing so!), and so, Naiva just smiled graciously and continued to take the video, using the loyal services of LumiB. At least I snuck some good shots of the admiral, who has a great face for painting. Revenge is best served cold and in watercolors...
JimmyB's 10 minutes of fame were followed by the main speaker, who admitted not being funny, and promised he would try to keep it short, too.
Well, he may have tried.
But he sure failed.
Miserably.
I was dead tired, but I kept my eyes open (unlike the judge who was sitting next to the JohnnyB, enjoying a very enviable nap). He told a tale of Philippines who were executed during the Philippine insurrection, and it was considered murder. Or not. Or maybe yes. Or not necessarily. Ask The JohnnyB - he actually followed the whole thing! As the esteemed judge finished his (short...) talk, we had an opportunity to witness an impressive amount of jerkiness. Some idiot (sorry, a highly distinguished idiot who actually goes by [first name] [last name] III) kept pondering and questioning on why the judge did not distribute his bibliography, and that it would be very important to have it, and on and on, just to put the judge down. The judge explained he has it in his briefcase, and he will be more than happy to give it to anyone who wants it, but Mr. Jerk III kept going and going - - - it was like watching Law & Order, with a uniquely nasty character in it. It was fun!
Eventually, it was over. As a compensation for the over-lawyerly ambience, we went to the SF Museum of Modern Art, and enjoyed an exhibition of Matisse, that shows his paintings as well as his sculptures (aha! you didn't know he sculpted, did you!?). It was fascinating to see that the master, too, worked in a series with some of this sculptures (OK, a 23-year series...), and how he went from realism to abstract. We strolled through the museum to see other painting and photography shows (with me wallowing in shame due to the loud comments by JimmyB and The JohnnyB). For dessert, we visited my all-time favorite piece of (hmm, art): The 3 white canvases... yes, that masterpiece is still there (only in a somewhat different layout!).
It now has a runner-up: "Indigo Blue". An installation composed of a huge (Huge!!!) pile of blue jeans in the middle of a HUGE room. And - the best part: a wooden table and stool where an attendant sits and erases text from a book titled "International Law Situations", published by the Naval War College Law Situations. An excerpt: "The attendant moistens an eraser with saliva, rubs out lines of text, and allows the eraser filings to accumulate into a pile at the book’s edge. Hamilton has described this activity as a way of 'using the body to re-mark history—taking the mechanically reproduced text and replacing it with the mark of the body.'" You can read more about it here.
I thought it would be highly delightful if JimmyB (who was looking very impressive in his formal US Navy uniform) approached the attendant and told her she cannot desecrate the book as such. In fact, I stated his whole bunch of lawyers, plus the admiral, should go to that exhibit and talk to the attendant.
But hey, that's just me.
Anyway, it was a good day out, away from the annoying mess that was sitting on my mind during this week.
Nothing like a day out, an art show and 3 Beard Papa's fresh cream puffs to revive the soul.
Labels: Acculturation, Art, People
Friday, August 10, 2007
Still Here...
...but so tired.
...Sooooooooooo bloody tired!!!
. . . .And somewhat sick and tired.
. . . .Mostly about that.
. . . . .. . . . . . .
Thought I whould share.
Labels: Profoundness
Monday, August 06, 2007
ArtPact #26
After the sudden August winter we had here yesterday, the sun has graciously agreed to get back to its seat, allowing me to photograph my work.
As I lengthily stated in my previous post, I am back to my self portrait. I am working small, in 5"x7" bozzettos, sticking with the same image, but trying different techniques, color schemes and styles. The idea is to experiment in small quick studies, and apply lessons I learn to the following versions.
I am working from a photo of myself. One that I truly like, taken by The JohnnyB. It's a challenging one, as it was taken at night, with a flash - not recommended when you need a reference photo to paint from. But in fact, the lack of inspiring light pattern is forcing me to find ways to make the painting interesting, so it has its merits.
I started in my usual style, rendering the face, religiously following the photo and trying to copy what I see. After the first one, I tried to move on to more exciting pastures, but I got stuck on copying for the next three attempts. The result: four bozzettos that are not really bad, but are not good either. They are hesitant, the colors are far from exciting. And, the ultimate original sin: they are overworked, and not in a good way.
The watercolor medium is the ultimate snitch when it comes to overworking. "Na na na na na", the bloody pigments taunt in that annoying watery voice, "Nava re-worked this to death! Heh heh!! Again!!! Hi hi!!!! Too funny!!!!!".
I was getting angry.
- - And bored.
- - - - And frustrated.
And I think it shows in the paintings. I swear I can hear my painted image yawning, "C'mon, have mercy! you can't leave me looking like that!".
It was midnight when I muttered to The JohnnyB, "I hope I don't end up never wanting to do a self-portrait ever again!". I was tired, and yet, decided to do one last bozzetto, and just have fun. Squeezed fresh paint, choosing bolder, less sweet-looking colors, going for staining pigments, so I cannot lift and repaint, took the brush - - - and went into one of those the-hell-with-it modes of painting.
When I got back to my senses - I stared at the result, with sheer terror. 'coz I never, like, ever, painted this way!
And then (took me a a while!) I realized that, Uhm, I am really, y'know, liking it!
And, to my surprise, The JohnnyB liked it too, saying it's clean, confident and looks like I knew what I was doing. Perhaps this was one of those rare occasions when the hand was faster than the mind, and did whatever it felt like, while my left brain was watching with disgust, saying, "Oh, screw it! I'm off duty now!".
I went to sleep, very excited, got up (very excited!), looked at what I did at night - and gave it another, similar shot, just to see if I can do it in a post-coffee conscious state of being.
Apparently, I can. (the one on the left is the first one, the right one was done in the morning). Hey, I even gave myself a gorgeous pair of blue eyes as a reward!
Definitely a breakthrough, and just what Mike has ordered.
Now, the wonderful thing about hitting the wall of boredom and getting past it into creativity, is that your mind is starting to spawn more and more ideas, like some freakish alien.
I wanted to try them all - but I was starting to run out of paper.
So, I soaked and stretched four half-sheets of watercolor paper, and while waiting for them to dry, I decided to try something while they are still wet. I combined walnut ink (which I passionately love!) with a purplish ink, and had my way with both on a sheet of paper. That yielded some veeeeeeeeeeeery cool texture, which will become a painting some day (when I figure out what to do with it...).
"Hmm, I should try this on a bozzetto", I overjoyed, and reached, again, for the inks. Obviously, I failed to recreate the texture, but still got some beautiful backgrounds, on which I drew with a bamboo stick and a twig.
That resulted in an unusual level of fun - and these two:
Then I decided to revert to the safety of the monochromatic world, and thoroughly enjoyed doing this one:
T h e n -I tried painting on top of some text which I have transferred to the watercolor paper with Acrylic medium. Now, this medium changes the surface of the watercolor paper beyond recognition, so that the watercolor paint starts beading like crazy, and you end up pulling your hair and looking pretty much like the resulting image...
Hmm... interesting would be the right word for that one, Eh? Although, the more I look at it, it is starting to grow on me. It sure is expressive, and has some interesting modern-art looking potential. It's a known fact that good things can come out of accidents and alleged-failures. All I need to do now is practice saying "Oh, I meant to do that!", and define myself as an expressionist painter.
So: 10 bozzettos overall, and I already have two additional ones in their very early stage.
I am exhausted.
previous ArtPact ... ...next ArtPact
Labels: Art, ArtPact, It's All About Me
Sunday, August 05, 2007
Breaking Through
We have our Annual Show coming up. Actually, two annual shows. One of the organization of which I am president, the other of a different art group. One demands only watermedia paintings, the other is about any kind of art. One has a very challenging theme, the other is, hmm - theme-less, so it seems.
And I take part in both. I am part of the overall organization of the first one, and I'm helping to hang the second one.
So, I need to make sure I actually enter paintings to both. I mean, it would be, y'know, silly to put all that time and effort into a show that I end up not having my own piece on the wall.
The theme of the first one paralyzed me for a while, but then set me on a thinking process (process? moi!?). And, after a discussion with QuiltieD, a fellow don't-know-what-to-paint-for-the-show-artist, I embarked on what might be an exciting journey: a new series about someone I spend a lot of time with. I have a pretty good knowledge of what is important to this person, what makes her tick, her life story, the struggle to belong. It's someone I like quite a bit, most of the time. Quite an intelligent woman, with a sense of humor I highly appreciate. And she is currently going through a major crisis, perhaps one of them mid-life crises. She does not feel yet that she fully belongs where she lives now, and has recently realized that her strong sense of belonging to the previous country was not quite realistic, as she went through a very rude awakening on her last visit.
Sucks, Ha?
I wouldn't want to be in her shoes.
Therefore, I am walking barefoot whenever I can..
Yup. It's all about me!!!
I decided to delve back into my self portrait, go back to what started here and continued - more successfully - here, and try to take it further.
I am a great believer in art therapy. Art was my stepping stones back to life after my world has shattered 7.5 years ago. And, in the past couple of years, every time I was deep down and managed to get myself to paint, it helped beyond description. Somehow, the bad feelings, the sorrow and grief, the anger and frustration, transfer through the brush to the paper - and a lot of the Giffa (Hebrew slang for, well, everything that sucks) stay there! I have several paintings that, whenever I look at them, I recall exactly what mood I was in, and what exactly caused that mood. They are not pretty pictures, not quite something someone would hang over the sofa next to their matching curtains, but they are the truest, most powerful paintings I've created.
A-n-y-w-a-y - I figured that since I am so troubled by this new wave of acculturation pangs, dealing with it via art might be the best therapy.
Now, this idea I have is very ambitious, as I want to incorporate this constant conflict into my work. During that conversation with QuiltieD, she asked me a couple of simple questions that stirred up a lot of ideas and emotions, and set me spinning on a spiral of ideas. The car has found the way home on it own that day.
That was Thursday afternoon.
Of course, once I came home, all excited and ready to go, I freaked.
First, it IS very ambitious, and how do I even start to begin to commence to initiate to make the first step???
Plus, it means dealing with some deep emotions and looking them in the face, digging deep down into my soul (as shallow as it may be). It may mean that I dive in and come back up on the other end with an answer I might not like - or no answer at all.
So I turned the TV on.
But after a couple of hours, consumed with guilt and self-reprimand at the wimp I've become, I did a couple more of those sketch-from-TV images, that turned out impressively disastrous.
The day after, I made a decision to go for it. Scribbled some ideas, first on paper and then moved to the computer, got stuck very quickly, and decided that if I am need time to think and stew, I might as well do it with a brush in my hand.
And, in the last couple of days, I started to practice my self portrait, working with the good old bozzettos. These little thingies are so great, as you are just exercising, and not as result-oriented. Did 6 so far, in different stages of finishing. However, the first ones turned out quite careful, weak and overworked. And, no matter how much I kept telling myself, "these are just exercises, chill out!! experiment!!!", I kept doing the same thing over and over again, ovrworking them in a struggle to make them succeed - which is the ultimate path to failure.
Tonight, a bit after midnight I got tired of my own face. Frustrated of the uninspired results so far, I commented to The JohnnyB, "I hope I don't end up never wanting to do a self-portrait ever again!".
I then decided to do one last bozzetto, before crashing to bed. After all that careful rendering of every detail, I decided to just have fun with the fifth one. Pure, careless fun, solely aimed at loosening up from this painting-on-eggshells mode that I got trapped in.
I never did a portrait that way. In fact, I am not sure I've ever painted this way, at least not as an adult. It was so much fun!
And I like it the best!!
And - to my astonishment - so does The JohnnyB!!!
And the fact it happend just when I got bored to tears of the subject, well... that means I hit the wall of boredom... and started creating rather than copying...
Hmm, sounds familiar. It should actually be a "Duh!" moment to anyone who took Mike's Beyond The Obvious class (twice!!).
And yet, I guess I forgot this intoxicating feeling.
I see an ArtPact coming...
Labels: Art, It's All About Me, Major Achievements
Thursday, August 02, 2007
It's a Bird... It's a Snowflake...
