30.1.12
You Will Turn Away
I'm usually too self-conscious or too lazy to write much, even knowing how good it is for the soul. On my latest flight across the Atlantic, though, I was very pleased to find myself unable to stop. I'd like to share some of those writings with you, despite my aforementioned hesitancy. Here are some thoughts on the creative process and of the real bitch in can be.
Do away with distraction.
At first you may be horrified by the sight of your atrophied dream, the pitiful state of your embryonic destiny. You will hear one thousand mocking voices and one million I-told-you-so's. You will want more than anything to turn away; to eat, to sleep, to clean, to hang-out, to drink, to fuck, to fuck-off, to tweet and facebook and rot comfortably back in front of your macbook pro. You will do anything to mute those desperate whimpers, the laments of your soul. You will turn away. You will cover up your embarrassment and shrink from the truth; you will cower and hide and reach for a snickers bar. It will be too much to bear and you will return to the sick and poisoned breast of your false mother.
Some time goes by, you frolicking about in a sort of complacent, happy stupor, until again, you notice a dull pain deep in your stomach, though this time slightly more pronounced than last. Like a toothache it won't go away; it will be insistent, nagging - more bothersome than painful. Eventually, you can't help it and you must scratch the itch. You drag your eyes from the fanfare around you and rest them on the blank page, the creative act... and this, slowly, becomes a mirror, a reflection of your true inner state.
As the image comes into focus, thoughts, emotions, fears, ghosts, sorrows and joys hurtle towards you intent on ripping the layers of shit you've covered yourself in off of your body. They want to splice you open; to bleed you, to break and shatter you. What they want is to make you anew. What they want is to open you wide so that you can drink in the universe and birth the world. What they want is to show you your true, manifold face.
Your coddled, conditioned mind will not like this, will thrash about like a fish on land and throw childish tantrums. But you will get, through the tumult, a taste of your most glorious nature. This torrent, this godlike blast of real shit will threaten to break you open and it will scare you to hell. Actually, it'll scare you into turning away once more, and you flip open your netflix to watch the next Office episode.
Easels and Ezra
I have a thing for fish, can't stop drawing them and painting them. :) I made that little sculpture fish to pose so that I can paint him like crazy with reference instead of trying to find good fish photos in books and online. I think I might make a whole school of colorful sparkly fish and hang them from my ceiling so it looks like they're swimming through my house. This is the first, his name is Ezra, and I love him. I hope you like him too.
Also, as you can see with the cracked up self portraits, my ribs gave me some grief this month. Can't lay out art projects on the floor so much anymore, so I went ahead and bought myself a real deal no-shit portable easel so I can sit or stand while I'm working and look out the window! Isn't it lovely!?
Fifth photo down is "Oso drops the Golden Ball and the briar rises from the water." It's an illustration for the ultimate moment of conflict in my story where sleeping beauty and the frog prince come together. :) Pastel on matte board has become a new favorite of mine.
Gearing up, paying discmakers, rehearsing with the group, writing new tunes, making a website, gonna be good shit. Lining up shows and picking the best one for a CD release.
Thinking of you friends and hoping you are well. I'm grateful for you all. (and did I mention I'm exceedingly proud of you fuckers as well? I didn't? Well shit, I am.)
Gearing up, paying discmakers, rehearsing with the group, writing new tunes, making a website, gonna be good shit. Lining up shows and picking the best one for a CD release.
Thinking of you friends and hoping you are well. I'm grateful for you all. (and did I mention I'm exceedingly proud of you fuckers as well? I didn't? Well shit, I am.)
26.1.12
25.1.12
Group Affirmation
Today's words of wisdom come from Rev. Bonnie Rose -
"Today - I acknowledge that the facts that once held me hostage no longer have any power over me...I recognize everything as something created and something that can easily dissolve through my clear intention for greater well-being. I love being a Deliberate Creator; I love my life. And so it is."
Aaaaaamen!
19.1.12
13.1.12
A Murder of Crows and Snow (2 of 4)
Moms and Dads!!
So far 2012 has quite possibly been turning into the best year of my little life. It seems all I have to do is give some meditation and focus to exactly what I want for myself, and BAM, it smacks me in the face- friendly-like, as if to say, "Here I am, ya dummy!" And then I grin and say, "Oh well of course, how did I not see that before???"
Yesterday at 11 a.m. I went to a photo shoot- My friend Christian put together a new record, and every musician that participated was in the photo shoot. As we were wandering around the gallery being goofy and having our pictures taken, I was once again struck by the amount of joy that has filled my life, by the people that I have come to befriend up here, and by the depth of our friendships.
I was also astounded by their ambition and talents, and by their drive to get shit done. I thought to myself,"Inés, you really need to pick up the slack. You need a real promo video, a press kit, a website..." As I let these thoughts flood me I became a bit overwhelmed, as I have a proclivity toward doing...
But as we were leaving the gallery, two of those wonderful friends asked me, "Hey, can we shoot an idea the artist video today? A promo video, ya know?"
This is what happened.
So far 2012 has quite possibly been turning into the best year of my little life. It seems all I have to do is give some meditation and focus to exactly what I want for myself, and BAM, it smacks me in the face- friendly-like, as if to say, "Here I am, ya dummy!" And then I grin and say, "Oh well of course, how did I not see that before???"
Yesterday at 11 a.m. I went to a photo shoot- My friend Christian put together a new record, and every musician that participated was in the photo shoot. As we were wandering around the gallery being goofy and having our pictures taken, I was once again struck by the amount of joy that has filled my life, by the people that I have come to befriend up here, and by the depth of our friendships.
I was also astounded by their ambition and talents, and by their drive to get shit done. I thought to myself,"Inés, you really need to pick up the slack. You need a real promo video, a press kit, a website..." As I let these thoughts flood me I became a bit overwhelmed, as I have a proclivity toward doing...
But as we were leaving the gallery, two of those wonderful friends asked me, "Hey, can we shoot an idea the artist video today? A promo video, ya know?"
This is what happened.
11.1.12
10.1.12
Bug'N Out
More to come. This is just my first round of photos with this new cam. Still getting used to the settings.
9.1.12
In 2012
Here's to your garden, with soil and seeds blossoming. What was once a newly planted garden full of hope and promise, is now a receding ghost of it's past endeavors. This is a photo of the garden I helped my dad create last spring. The Romaine lettuce turned into bushes, the broccoli turned to seed, we got some awesome carrots(baby) and some hearty kale. The strawberries were fun but short lived. I attribute their short life spans to the local scrub jays and pecker birds that kept fucking with my dad's and I's bounty. The garden is no more. I wasn't around to tend to it. I was on tour for almost half of the year and only saw these plants in a midway stage after first harvest. I just wasn't around, man.
Who knows if Bruce will replant for next season. My guess is no. I'm ok with it, even though I might persuade him that the effort was worth the two nights of broccoli and awesome strawberries. Maybe he got some subliminal healing and growth from watering the plants. I recommend a family garden at any time.
I came home for December and it felt great. I had a week home to get into the swing of the solitude of the valley before Adam and I got hard at work on this film score that we will be performing at the Lobero on Feb4th. It's a pretty surreal concept to write music to a film. We are writing the music to a silent film made in 1927 by a German named F.W. Mernau. It's called Faust. It is netflixable and is worth the brief introduction of the first 5 minutes to the 2 hour film. Super cool shit. I just hope we can get our shit together to pull it off live during the Santa Barbara Film Fest...music critics are CRITICS man. I hope people show up stoned enough.
I find instagram very very fascinating. I think it is such a great depiction of the world that we are living in. I basically got rid of a FREE android phone that works perfectly fine, just to use instagram and all of the iphones super fun apps. I was hard pressed for an excuse for my mother as to why I needed to buy a new phone when the one I have works perfectly fine. "For the Photos Mom" I said. And it's true. I think it's fascinating that we have these phones that do so much, all in one pockets sized gadget. These photos we take all get filtered to look as though they are old and tangible and vintage and slick, and we express what we see to a constant stream of other peoples similar visions on this internet based app to share our experience on this earth. I want to be slicker, to have gear that has more vibe, to take what's been given and make it loook good and feeeeel good. If I'm going to spend time with it, I want it to feeeeel goood.
I'm still trying to judge how much better my life is with my iphone that I needed so bad. I'll get used to it soon perhaps, but I think the whole shibang of the story represents where I'm headed for 2012.
I'm in Portland right now. The cat you see is that of our roommate Brandon. The cat's name is Gus, and he's a baller. He likes deep rough tugging pets that make it feel like a porno when I pet him. He only comes in at night or early in the morning. He's somewhat of a sentinal. A guardian. I haven't been able to leave this house we are renting for the entire week I've been here in Portland. We've been writing songs all day in a cold basement ending most nights with a cold 40oz of Colt 45. This malt liquor just seems to have the most style points. It's lubricated this blog post for sure.
Fuckin A man. Drunkinly writing to you from a dining room table in Portland, realizing I havent posted in a while, but still love the shit out of all you mom's and dads.
Happy
New
Year
Here's to a new style...and..........Coachella 2012 :)
Who knows if Bruce will replant for next season. My guess is no. I'm ok with it, even though I might persuade him that the effort was worth the two nights of broccoli and awesome strawberries. Maybe he got some subliminal healing and growth from watering the plants. I recommend a family garden at any time.
I came home for December and it felt great. I had a week home to get into the swing of the solitude of the valley before Adam and I got hard at work on this film score that we will be performing at the Lobero on Feb4th. It's a pretty surreal concept to write music to a film. We are writing the music to a silent film made in 1927 by a German named F.W. Mernau. It's called Faust. It is netflixable and is worth the brief introduction of the first 5 minutes to the 2 hour film. Super cool shit. I just hope we can get our shit together to pull it off live during the Santa Barbara Film Fest...music critics are CRITICS man. I hope people show up stoned enough.
I find instagram very very fascinating. I think it is such a great depiction of the world that we are living in. I basically got rid of a FREE android phone that works perfectly fine, just to use instagram and all of the iphones super fun apps. I was hard pressed for an excuse for my mother as to why I needed to buy a new phone when the one I have works perfectly fine. "For the Photos Mom" I said. And it's true. I think it's fascinating that we have these phones that do so much, all in one pockets sized gadget. These photos we take all get filtered to look as though they are old and tangible and vintage and slick, and we express what we see to a constant stream of other peoples similar visions on this internet based app to share our experience on this earth. I want to be slicker, to have gear that has more vibe, to take what's been given and make it loook good and feeeeel good. If I'm going to spend time with it, I want it to feeeeel goood.
I'm still trying to judge how much better my life is with my iphone that I needed so bad. I'll get used to it soon perhaps, but I think the whole shibang of the story represents where I'm headed for 2012.
I'm in Portland right now. The cat you see is that of our roommate Brandon. The cat's name is Gus, and he's a baller. He likes deep rough tugging pets that make it feel like a porno when I pet him. He only comes in at night or early in the morning. He's somewhat of a sentinal. A guardian. I haven't been able to leave this house we are renting for the entire week I've been here in Portland. We've been writing songs all day in a cold basement ending most nights with a cold 40oz of Colt 45. This malt liquor just seems to have the most style points. It's lubricated this blog post for sure.
Fuckin A man. Drunkinly writing to you from a dining room table in Portland, realizing I havent posted in a while, but still love the shit out of all you mom's and dads.
Happy
New
Year
Here's to a new style...and..........Coachella 2012 :)
8.1.12
Wetlands!
Moms & Dads! Wetlands EP is out!
All proceeds go directly to Xela AID! This is the organization that Jeremy and I worked with this summer in Guatemala. They are a small non-profit that works closely and conscienciously with Guatemalan families to break the cycle of poverty through educational and financial oppurtunities (http://www.xelaaid.org/).
You can buy the EP for $5 at: http://wetlands1.bandcamp.com/
Spread the word!
Love,
Juice
5.1.12
4.1.12
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