Nocturnal Artist

When I draw, I get so focused on my work that it becomes impossible to critique it clearly. By either using a mirror, or taking a photo of the work, you can see your work from a new viewer's perspective. I made this .gif from those photos:

My room was a time capsule.
I invited the cat in,
and latched that antique door.
Two loves sat on the bed,
one with dilated green eyes,
and one with a guitar in hands.
They said we would be cast through space,
scaling the stars
in a dizzying fashion.
The room was still.
Preserved on the 28th.
I questioned
the position
of every object.
The medicine on the floor,
the sideways bottle,
the crooked books on the shelf.
I couldn't imagine
a shifting speck
of dirt,
or drinking the rest of my coffee.
We were just three humans and a cat, surrounded by walls and statues.

The word "courage" stems from the Latin word for heart: "cor". "Age" comes from the Latin suffix "aticum", which can indicate action, collection, state of being...

Courage is acting from the heart, or even just the state of having heart. I like that.

Brainsick adj: Mentally disordered.

Brassica n: Plants from the genus Brassica, such as broccoli, cabbage, and mustard.

Bravura n: 1) A musical passage requiring excellent agility and technical skill. 2) A show of daring brilliance.

Brecciate vt: To break a rock into fragments.

Brevity n: Shortness of duration, or conciseness of expression.

Briar n: A plant which has a woody and prickly or thorny stem. (Rose, blackberry.)

Brittle a: Easily broken, cracked, or snapped.

Bromeliad n: Plants from the genus Bromelia, such as pineapple, spanish moss, and various ornamentals.

Bromidic adj: Lacking in originality. (A bromide, in regards to people, is someone tiresome or boring.)

Brusque (also brusk) adj: 1) Markedly short and abrupt. 2) Blunt in manner or speech, often to the point of ungracious harshness.

Brute adj: 1) Of or related to beasts. 2) Inanimate. 3) Cruel or savage.

In my mind I always knew
I didn't have much for looks.
Rather than catching young men's eyes,
I turned my own to books.

Though art and thought occupied my time,
I grew increasingly jealous
of girls who never read a line,
but were still upheld desirous.

With later age
my body changed
my acne-marked face cleared up.
Frazzled hair became soft and tame,
and those books I soon forgot.

Now I've known lust a thousand times,
and with more partners than I care to name,
but I owe all love to my intelligence,
not the beauty I became.

We don't always like what we put on the page. Understatement. The inadequacy can be shameful, disgusting, and painful. Some days, I don't keep more than a phrase. The brushwork seems sloppy, and the proportions are off. I have thrown away paintings and whole journals without regret.

Friends, family, strangers...

After some internal debate about fears and publicity, I've decided to reopen this blog. Maybe it's to share my thoughts, or maybe to get a glimpse of my own head from the outside, but I'm not sure. I've been pretty confused lately.

Truth be told, I've spent a long time trying to disguise a fucked up psychology. A poem from 2012:


The more I learn, the more I realize that modern psychology is just a means of applying a label to a set of symptoms. And it's harmful.

It's harmful because at 13 years old I got my first diagnosis. I was told, in paraphrase, that I was mentally ill, that most people with mental illnesses never get better, and that my future was likely suicide if I didn't fix myself.

It's harmful because it implies that there is a correct way to live life, and that it's not okay to relax with symptoms that are really quite human. It creates an expectation of constant happiness, but we have all experienced more emotions than visible colors. There is a sense of shame and inferiority stamped on every label. It also places so much importance on things that are out of your control. The past can't be changed, but it supposedly molded you. Genetics are also inescapable, and for the longest time, I think I identified myself with that pile of diagnoses more than I identified myself by my own name. However, the human mind is remarkably malleable, and the present moment is completely new. Every single second of your life is fresh.

At 13, I got my first bottle of pills. I got my first stay in a mental institute. I got my first journal, and I've been writing ever since.

I've had enough with hidden issues. Sometimes I panic, sometimes I get depressed, sometimes my thoughts race, and sometimes I can't sleep, but I'm not going to spend the rest of my life hiding in a drawer beside my bed.

This is an acrylic painting of Robert Fripp based on the album cover of Red by King Crimson. I submitted this painting to the UMF art gallery at the end of my fall semester, and found out only when the painting had been taken off display that it was hanging in the first place. Too bad I couldn't post a picture of it on display!

I have never taken any serious interest in watercolor before, so I thought I would give it a try. I'm definitely liking some of the paintings I've been experimenting with.

Hello! I've just created a community art project called Letters From Strangers and I would really love it if you would check it out and participate!

You send an anonymous letter to a stranger. You get an anonymous letter from a stranger. Pretty cool, huh?

After intense struggles with life itself, I've finally reached a place of contentment. I transferred to a new university with a clean slate. My classes are stimulating, and both my productivity and creativity have soared lately! As a result, I'm posting to the blog again. My classes are fairly rigorous, but I have heaps of spare time as well.

Along with the university is a new painting class. I'm exploring mediums I have very little comfort in. Recent practices have been with Cray-Pas. I find them gooey and imprecise, which contrasts my usual style. My first attempt with them was an unsharable disaster, but to the left is the result of my most recent practice session.

The drawing is a study of color, done in patches rather than in intricate detail. I spent nearly three hours in a field sitting on moist grass. My legs were asleep, and every time I switched positions I was jabbed by pins and needles. Nevertheless, every artist should step out of his comfort zone to grow and become more in touch with his creative process.

We are awesome!

I am so incredibly frustrated.

My family's adorable new kitten decided to completely shred some of my works. It left me pretty devastated. Kittens will be kittens, so I keep my door shut at all hours now, and made sure that my remaining art was safely stored away in a portfolio. Problem solved, right?

Wrong. I live in Maine, in a very drafty old house. I came home last night to a room that was literally freezing. As in, under 32 degrees Fahrenheit. I found a bottle of frozen water by my bed.

It's not a big problem. I can protect my works from a little kitten AND keep my door open if I find a new way to store things. That doesn't mean I'm not angry about it.

After spells of drawing aimlessly I begin to question myself. I want to know why I've been repeatedly drawing the same, meaningless things. I want to move on to bigger, better artworks, but I don't have the time or materials. Why keep drawing flowers, landscapes, and fruit?

Because practice gives us the skills we need to be successful in later projects.

The experience from studies on anatomy or value, line or perspective will be there to support your work when the inspiration does strike. That's when you can focus on your idea, instead of struggling with the mechanics.

It's an elementary concept, but sometimes when work gets boring a reminder becomes necessary. I just wish I had remembered this when my instructor had me drawing a billion bikes last year.

What better time is there to practice drawing faces than a boring class?

I just scanned an image, resized it, and then lost it some how. I would say that's a pretty good indication that this nocturnal artist should try to get some sleep.

Passing the time in one of my classes.