NOBODY FREAK OUT

NOBODY FREAK OUT
(photo by rachel wright, 2010)
[mucked around with by me, 2011]

This has been my favorite phrase for a while now. It all started one day, with my family riding in the car down a highway in Israel. To our right: desert. To our left: desert. Ahead: desert. Behind us? Yep, more desert, and an occasional mountain or two. And lo and behold, a road sign approached us from the right. It looked just like the kind that tells you to slow for an upcoming curve, or to watch for falling rocks - only this one was rather existentially challenged and/or challenging (we haven't really decided yet.) I wish{!} I had a picture. It was a simple triangle shaped sign, trimmed in urgent-red, with a single, large, black exclamation point in the middle. That's it.          No words.           No other supporting imagery.        

Considering the signs intrinsic *emphatic-ness*, we felt it was probably in our best interest to figure out what, exactly, this sign could be warning us about; and with the hope that we'd do it before the thing we were being warned about found us:

1. warning: falling punctuation - be careful what you say and hear, as random commas, semicolons,  question marks and such could insert themselves into the conversation creating severe communication chaos; for example: Pass me! that bag of rasp-- berries oh a camel where's?! the cam;era, when you need. it oh! i never! lik,ed camels raspberries. are too seedy?

2. warning: rampant paranoiac activity ahead - entering an area, or vortex, where anything and everything could happen - so just watch out, you know, generally - for everything and anything; you have been warned. be warned. go forth in a constant state of being warned. may the warning be with you. the warning is strong with this one... {ad nauseum}

3. a road-sign makers cruel cruel joke - maybe they sometimes sit further down the road just to watch people's perplexed faces as they drive past; wringing they're hands and laughing maniacally 'mwah ha ha'


4. Or maybe it was a simple piece of advice - that in a world of uncertainty (the proverbial, infinite-in-scope, exclamation point that we all live in) - one should remember to keep calm. Know that there will be exclamation points around you, and the best thing one can do - is to not only remind yourself, but everyone else (in an !emphatic! tone of voice):

NOBODY FREAK OUT


Which brings me nicely to two of my favorite songs of late - that juxtapose so nicely as to completely refute what I've just said, that I felt it necessary to post them here - because it reminds me, to never be too serious about anything because once you think you've figured something out, the opposite of that thing will present itself to you... rather boldly... and wearing a smirky grin.

{warning! contains some strong language}





and because the funny thing about writing a blog - is that there's no one to stop you -- I'm going to negate myself again:




1.17.11, update

Found a pic of the sign:

And found out that it means: "dangerous place"
So our musings still apply.


But more intriguingly, is this new perplexity of a sign:

Notice, though, it's not a dot, its a hexagon.
Beware floating hexagons!
or... 6-sided things in general!
or... you are now entering the 6th dimension...

I'm glad we didn't see this sign; though it would seem to connote less possible danger - it's exactly that discrepancy between something seemingly innocent, yet required a warning sign all it's own, which makes this sign truly the more nerve wracking of the two.

Up to Something: Part III, Clown Vs. Monkey!!!

It's all coming together... for the last year(?) or so, I've been drawing backgrounds for the soon to be released Clown Vs. Monkey .

Over the last couple of weeks, I've been a machine - knocking these puppies out left, right AND center... here's a few, or you can click here to see the whole album (you may need to hit 'refresh' if you've seen it before).

enjoy ;)

jungle fever

starship bananaprise

tear jerker

oh, and for an extra treat - here's one of my backgrounds in action:

cheers,

me

Up to Something: Part II, It's All Irish to Me...

I did the following short story using characters from the book I'm writing (Yes, a book. What is it, you ask? I call it an "Epidemic" = An Epic Comedy Drama with Apocalyptic Tendencies) to relay my Ireland experience. It was more interesting than *me* telling it, for sure, and it was a great chance to practice writing dialogue (my absolute least favorite aspect of writing a novel) and an opportunity to build some back story for these characters. It even ended up with a nice twist at the end, that I didn't see coming till I got there ;)

click here for the story... go on, i'll wait here for you.

{goes to get coffee...}

done? ah. So now you can see I rather failed at the 'exercise in dialogue writing' part, hehe... I promise my book has more actual dialogue and less soliloquy. (Though not necessarily between these two characters; awkward tends to be their norm, at this point anyway.)


cheers,
me

Up to Something: Part I

A friend recently scolded me for 'making' her follow my blog, but then my not having posted anything since she did. True. I've been bad. but busy. sooooooo...

What have I been doing?

Let's start where I left off by looking at those polaroids I promised in my last post. It was exciting to finally push the capture button on my vintage SX-70 (see previous post) and have something actually pop out the front. The film I got from The Impossible Project, "TZ-Artistic, Paul Giambarba Edition" for Polaroid Type SX-70. I must say, I'm a little disappointed in the quality. Though occasionally the overexposed, unsaturated aesthetic works -- it made getting a good shot difficult. Here's the best I've got so far:

 for comparison's sake, here's a photoshop enhanced version (though i didn't remove the linear artifact that runs through the middle. these lines showed up on several prints, though not all):

I happened to take this camera with me to Ireland, as well as my shiny new Sony NEX-5 (love love love - it has interchangeable lenses, fits in my purse, lightweight & is almost as good as a pro dslr) - how's that for diametric opposites? While riding the train to Dublin, I got antsy waiting for some sheep to show up on the endless farm lands that whooshed past us & decided to experiment a bit. The following were shot holding my NEX-5 in my right hand, pointing it through the viewfinder on my polaroid which I held in my left hand, pressed up to the train's window glass.... I love the painterly quality that these images have in person (don't know if it is obvious in these lower resolution images here) - but I'm excited about this series and am looking forward to taking my time getting good (BIG) prints of them eventually:

cheers,

me

ps- be back w/ more of what I've been doing soon... (next up: Ireland & a short story)

Oh The Impossibilities... or, Dusting Off the Old Polaroid SX-70

I purchased this beautiful Polaroid SX-70 over a decade ago, thinking that one day I'd search out some film for it. Which I never did. And then Polaroid went out of business. grrrr & double grrrr

October 2008, Enter: The Impossible Project

From what I can gather, a couple of artist/photographers got together and bought a Polaroid plant & then made the impossible happen - they started producing polaroid film. And not just the standard 600 kind either - no no, they started with film for the SX-70 (produced from 1972-1981).

I bought the TZ ARTISTIC Paul GIAMBARBA edition (EXPIRED) for $24.50
I only get 8 shots.
That's over 3 bucks a pop.
But I don't care, in fact
I get something even better...
I finally {cue angels singing} get to pull my Polaroid SX-70 off of the mantlepiece, and for the first time in our relationship - get to see it for more than just a pretty thing.... I get to push it's freakin buttons... oh yeah baby... and it's love from first click.... I'll post images soon ;)

Now go shop for your own Impossibilities here:
http://www.the-impossible-project.com/

DIY Digital Camera Diffuser

I recently volunteered to take photos for an event and would've preferred to use my nice film camera with a pro flash, but film would've been cost prohibitive, so I decided to take my little digital camera. My Fujifilm FinePix S700 has been a handy digital camera for family photos and whatnot; but is a basic consumer level camera with a harsh built-in flash -- which I try not to ever use. The event was at night, indoors in an art gallery with loads of artificial lighting - there were large windows in the front, but one can never count on sunlight in Seattle - so I knew I'd have to use the flash. ack. So after some quick internet research, and only an hour until the event (!), I came up with this solution...

If your camera has a small enough flash, a simple solution is a white/translucent film canister. For larger flashes, I've seen people use rubbing alcohol bottles.

Simply hold the canister up to your flash, trace the shape with a fine point sharpie onto the canister, use an exacto knife to cut out a hole snug enough to just slide over your flash; this plastic was thin and easy to cut.

This amount of diffusion may be fine for some situations, but I found that there was still too much contrast & glare, so I tried adding a sheet or two of plain printer paper inside the canister -- just enough to cover the inside surface, but not over the cut hole.

Then I tested the camera without the diffuser, with it & with one and two pieces of paper inside:

I did have some ambient natural light, but very little since it's a cloudy day (go figure), and no artificial light. I think I'd be fine using just one piece of paper, and it'll probably depend on whatever the lighting conditions are -- but I think it's a nice little trick for basic shooting needs. Plus the pop-off lid makes it really easy to change how much paper is in the canister ;)

Unfortunately for the event I shot (Seattle's Etsy Craft Party), I hadn't yet discovered the paper trick, and shot with just the canister - so I ended up with more glare & harsh shadows than I wanted, but it turned out okay, especially with some photoshop tweaking... here's a shot from the night featuring artwork by Zoe Williams:

see the rest of the photos here


Happy Shooting!!

New Song Sunday - Gypsy Love

Gypsy punk band Gorgol Bordella's latest album Transcontinental Hustle is a frantic, verging on chaotic, but ultimately passionate explosion of sound. It's so rich, that I find it difficult to listen to the whole thing in one setting; but they are absolutely top of my 'I gotta see this band live' list. Here's one of the catchier tunes from the album:

...and for your visual pleasure, this "Gypsy" treasury featuring yours truly and other talented etsians (curated by westbournegrove):

New Song Sunday - Don't Touch

'liminality' by tracy yarkoni

"The liminal state is characterized by ambiguity, openness, and indeterminacy. One's sense of identity dissolves to some extent, bringing about disorientation. ..." (wikipedia)

Shot with Canon AE-1 on 35mm film at the Museum of Modern Art in New York. These three shots were long exposures (a few seconds each) which I overlapped in Photoshop, matching up the lines of the escalators. The ghostly bodies appear together from these three separate layers so that they become intertwined. It is difficult to know where one body begins and the other ends. A ghostly limb here, a disembodied face there, solitary people now standing intimately close to one another...


With that in mind, and for the sake of irony, here's the song:

New Song Sunday - NYC Gone Gone

This week is the opening of the Cooper-Hewitt's National Design Triennial: Why Design Now?

And my super-amazing, awe-inspiring, big sis and artiste extraordinaire Rachel Wright, has a piece in it - yeah, she rocks. Sigh, I'll be able to say "I knew her when..." AND I get to be her arm candy in New York City next week for the reception. Life is good ;)

Rachel Wright & Tracy Yarkoni, 

Champs Elysees Paris April 2001, photograph by Rachel Wright

Let the preparations begin, here's Conor Oberst with "NYC-Gone Gone":


Here is Rachel's piece in the exhibit:

About this design: "I based it on the traditional Maori facial tattoos. These gentlemen would “sign” documents and contracts by drawing their unique facial tattoo instead of signing their names." -Rachel Wright


More Wright designs:

Stories of Art, Part II

Part I of my posts on James Elkins’ Stories of Art begged the questions:

Is the Story of Art History a multicultural one? Or is it an inherently Western Story?

Why does it matter {how the Story of Art is told} anyway?

the pale blue dot, from NASA's website

Before I can begin to answer these questions, I must look back at where the discipline of Art History began. Weird to think that at some point it was non-existant, no? In my world, it’s as essential as Math or English. But as far as the universe is concerned, Art History is barely a blip on the radar. Which reminds me, have you ever seen the famous “pale blue dot” photo of the earth taken by Voyager 1 as it exited our solar system? The earth appears as a single pale blue pixel lost in the vastness of space – as though it were a blemish on an otherwise dark spectral canvas that begs to be photoshopped out. That’s the kind of perspective I’m talking about ;)