Paint Withdrawal

i've been re-reading these two epistolary novels by nick bantock (that is since i last bought them 3 years back), about Griffin and Sabine, a postcard artist and a postal stamp illustrator who write to each other from different ends of the world. In fact, so compelling is the art that the book itself is composed of the letters and postcards with these multifarious artworks that stun me into a shade of green. i have nothing new done on the art front- architecture having wormed its tyrannous tentacles around my palate of excuses- only this one oil painting* done in a fit of contagious anger that i caught off the streets of 105th and 107th.

~

*it was really done last semester and i promise i will post a picture of the rest of it once i take a decent photograph of it.

Nothing Much But Random Life So Far

“Piglet sidled up to Pooh from behind. "Pooh," he whispered.

"Yes, Piglet?"

"Nothing," said Piglet, taking Pooh's paw, "I just wanted to be sure of you."”

-A.A.Milne

The Slumbering Spring

I must have slept a good half of my spring break away, only to wake up to some giant juicy scallop dinner (tasty!)and bruising snowboarding the next day. Now I'm back in NYC, in front of the computer with a cold creeping into full blast. Watching the jasmine-orange-pekoe tea bundle slowly blossom, hot water in my glass cup.

Still White

I must admit, there has been too much activity on the computer these days, what with taking a digital studio and picking up a character on WoW. It's my excuse for not blogging in a while. >.<

Grapefruit

It's been a rough start to the semester. What with the onset of a terribly debilitating fever and the lack of proper sleep due to jetlag. I've been a bad artist. I'd rather take photographs than paint because I'm lazy.

Breakfast grapefruit instructions: cut along the equator, take spoon and eat parcels with as little squirting as possible. drink the leftover juice from hemisphere.

puppy's way of eating grapefruit. undoubtedly fun.

With a Little Help from My Friend

i have yet to find the words to this picture. finally, i am my own model, having enlisted the help of the illustrious Aleka Drea.

Ducky Flies Home

Homebound the day after tomorrow, I'll be spending christmas in a plane, toasting champagne. What a semester. Here's hoping things get easier with the new year. I must say, New York has been such a b****. One always struggles to find beauty in the harshness, pushes you to keep searching. Well enough of that for now. I have the comforts of home, wonderful sunshine, glad faces of family AND the time to enjoy it for 3 weeks. The happier girl is me. ^_~

Icicle Night

First, I woke up to a great breakfast of warm toast, delicious scrambled eggs, and one of the best mushroom dishes I've had in quite a while.

Then, it started snowing. Beautifully.

I spent the entire day (and night) slaving away at my essay (it's now done!) while a light rain baked the fresh snow on the trees and everywhere in New York into icicles.

Lastly, in the euphoria of the essay off my list of finals, I ran out into the early morning streets with a camera and tripod, freezing but happy.

3 hours of Daylight

Thanks to my studio hangover, I don't get sleepy till 4am and I don't wake up before 1pm the following day. After the final studio reviews, I happily deluded myself into thinking it was time for a break, until today, when I woke up to the sobering reality of the 3 more deadlines ahead of me, 2 of which are due in 5 days. 5 days to kick out an essay about the Italian Renaissance and to figure out animation in 3Ds Max. Wheeee.

With the approach of winter, the sun sets at 4pm, giving me an excuse to take yet another denial break and stare out my window contemplating the passing of autumn. Damn i wish i took more walks in central park.

Opera

The Queen of the Night's Aria in the second act. (Note: This video is not the same as the performance i watched tonight though.)


So we decided to be bad students for one night and ran down to the Met Opera at 65th and Broadway to catch our last chance to watch Mozart's Die Zauberflöte this season. It was truly amazing. Props to the set and costume designers for this one... amazing designs, clean, oriental, futuristic, very strange but beautiful.

The highlight of the night though was discovering this lady who played Pamina's role, Genia Kühmeier. She has the most beautiful voice I've heard live, and me and diego completely preferred her singing the Queen of the Night's.



Just to throw in the irresistable tidbit, Die Zauberflöte was first performed in 1791, Vienna, and it struck me today that one of the things that I love about opera is the fact that we're watching the self-same performances that the people 200 years ago watched... kinda makes me wish that sound-recording devices existed then.

Angel of Pop and Time Relativity.

I've just discovered this completely irresistable tool called the rasterbator. You plop photographs into it, it gives you the photograph- in circles. Me, I particularly like this Calvin Klein underwear angel. Xp

On other fronts, studio work is finally looking up, with 3.5 weeks left to the finish and about 5.5 weeks left to home. I can't believe this semester is almost over. Isn't it universally true that time speeds up when you get older? If months seem like days now, I wonder what a year might seem like when I'm 50.

Nature's Big Event

Big Event Blog

Click the picture for the album. It was a really really great Christian retreat, in the midst of New York's finest season, Autumn.

The Parade that never was.

so me and the make-shift Nick Fury went down to east village to watch the legendary New York Halloween Parade. suffice to say, all of the streets from 23rd to the 14th were blocked off because of the sheer volume of paraders. we never made it there. we did however get our feast of sights, i must confess that the ones shown here were merely the beginnings of the thickening crowd, and i fast ran out of photo space before we hit the real meat of costumed revellers.

Fisheye Freaks

halloween happiness. ^x<

5 more weeks left before the final review (le gasp!) and my studio work is in tatters. (God help me) i'm hoping some miracle will find its way onto my lap soon enough. that said, i'm looking forward to a weekend at lake champion and nice big fat halloween parade on wednesday! diego's got his pirate wig out, complete with eye-patch and i'm going as a myself, oops, i mean a cat. *mreow*

sketchbook: anatomy

it's something to keep in mind, that when i'm finally supposed to take a break, i can't seem to keep my hands still. i've been sorely neglecting to draw, and it struck me when during my italian renaissance class, there was that fascination about the body that i left behind.

nonetheless, here are some rather awkward re-beginnings.



another thing i've discovered over the lectures of the italian renaissance, was that the great guys like Leonardo and Michelangelo always begun things, projects, studies, and seldom ever completed them- mostly because they were starting too many things (due to overwhelming bright-eyed fascination, i expect). is it then a failure to start things, and leave them unfinished? it is no coincidence then, that the word renaissance, meaning re-birth, seems all the more poignant, even in a sentimentally ironic way.

*sigh*

Björk

she only happens to be one of my favouritest artist. we went to see her in concert at madison square garden last night. stunning.

here's another video of hers, it's one of the best music videos out there (or not out there), it's not for the faint-hearted, though. (link)

Rally.

Tomorrow, at 11.30am, the students of Columbia University will rally and show their dissatisfaction with visiting President of Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who will speak at an international conference here.

The school has been swamped over with posters all over campus and beyond for a week now with the man's (mis)deeds, showing his sense of what justice is. TV reporters have been camping outside the school gates, security has been tightened- and though all still largely remains peaceful- just today, the tension is palpable as my friends and I carry out our daily business of schoolwork. Our minds churning with the usual stresses of crazy deadlines, while trying to make sense of what is happening here in our hearts.

---------------

updated*



To be noted, here are some unforgettable points in the opening note, by Lee Bollinger, President of Columbia University:

“Mr. President, you exhibit all the signs of a petty and cruel dictator,... you are either brazenly provocative or astonishingly uneducated... I doubt that you will have the intellectual courage to answer these questions.”

(article)

acrylic tryout

"there's no space in the apartment for me to leave pieces of paintings lying about to dry."

that's my excuse to buy some acrylics and try them out for once. i guess i'm posting this incomplete piece up before i feel like my blog has become a tad too intimidating for myself to put my less than perfect pieces up in.

/spinning/

in only the words that Murakami from Dance Dance Dance can make,


"When I was little, I had this science book. There was a section on 'What would happen to the world if there was no friction?' Answer: 'Everything on earth would fly into space from the centrifugal force of revolution.'" That is my mood.

black.eyed.barbie

meet another one of my best friends, S.

she's just your regular Snow White.

gone renegade.

<3