Obama and the Arts

Here is an article about Obama and his policies on the arts.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601088&sid=ap7gUJzSjIYs&refer=muse

A flood of newness

I'm quite happy with my country tonight.
What a great time to be back in the states.
People in my neighborhood are celebrating and screaming in the street.
Everyone is laughing and crying.

THough half of the country may be dismayed,
it is quite an achievement that this night has occured.

Smiling Inside

Today, walking to work in the underground
I passed by a girl with a blue "Save Britney" t-shirt
with a red and white "Vote Obama" pin attached to her chest.
The frivolity and sincerity made me smile inside.

Arthur Ganson Sculpture Machines

http://www.arthurganson.com/quicktimes/Artichoke_One.mov

Check this out. It's spellbinding.

very interesting BBC Documentary

Sunday Afternoon

Sitting in my living room with a cup of coffee, bagel, and reading a a book,
I hear a car horn honk to the tune of the Godfather.
The first five nine notes repeatedly.
I am in New York.

Inspired by Edison in Love

Okay, so I post other people's poetry because, well, it's beautiful and wholesome. This is the first time I am posting my own. I'm putting it out there and so...uhm.....yeah....

it seems I speak better in poetry and
understand the comfort of impossibility through it.
For those who have been loved to, in a certain way,
and decided to give all your love anyway.
To the dolls and the whores,
the housewives and the mistress,
the ones who cared impossibly hard
with no shadow of reciprocity,
But mostly to those who get on with
the disaster of the aftermath,
Feel newer each day.

Edison in Love, by Robin Ekiss

Thomas Edison loved a doll
with a tiny phonography inside
because he made her speak.

Is there any other reason
to love a woman? Did she say
the ghost of my conception

or something equally demure?
It's hard to be sure how he feels
when he holds me, I fall apart.

I'm projecting here. He didn't feel
her first transgression
was in having no expression.

Rene Descartes, too, traveled alone
with a doll-in-a-box
he called his daughter. Francine,

Francine... is it better to be silent
and wait for everything
we were promised?

Or should we love them back,
the way a train loves its destination,
as if we have the machinery necessary for it?

Crumple and the Ixits

This is my final project. It's film so something gets lost in the cross over, but it will give you a taste of the piece.

Wednesday, the World's biggest particle excelerator gets flicked on!!!!

This wednesday the biggest particle excelerator ever created will be flicked on in an attempt to recreate the conditions that existed immediately after the Big Bang occured. This facily in Switzerland cost 2 billion

This is an amazing event that has the potential (although unlikely) to create a black hole in our midst. I hope to still be able to see you all on the 11th. :)

Article about the Eventful switch on!
http://cosmiclog.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2008/09/05/1356379.aspx
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/2650665/Legal-bid-to-stop-CERN-atom-smasher-from-destroying-the-world.html
http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2008/aug/07/research.cern?gusrc=rss&feed=education

Links:
http://public.web.cern.ch/Public/Welcome.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CERN

79 by ee cummings (thank you rebs!)

let it go -- the
smashed word broken
open vow or
the oath cracked length
wise -- let it go it
was sworn to
____________go

let them go -- the
truthful liars and
the false fair friends
and the boths and
neithers -- you must let them go they
were born
___________to go

let all go -- the
big small middling
tall bigger really
the biggest and all
things -- let all go
dear
___________so comes love

Lousa, Portugal...with Mom and Dad!

Photos of Portugal Trip:

- Serra da Lousa. A beautiful swimming hole in the hills.

-Mom and dad in serra da Lousa. My dad and I think that building behind them is an old wheel house.

- A road that runs along a beautiful park where we had a walk, some beers, and food.

-Me and my dad having drinks in bar and watching football. :)

Ireland....with mom and dad!

Photos from Ireland.
-My dad and mom at the Guiness Storehouse Panoramic Bar.
-Me on a street in Dalkey
-My dad and me in a pub.
-My mom, looking very proper, with tea in the hotel Lobby.

'82 Tonys--Dreamgirls

Why sometimes theatre is better than cinema. This is the original theatre version.

Are, Sweden (pronounced Ohrrrrrrrrrrrrr)

Here are some photos of the village church, graveyard, the mountain biking/skiing slope and the view from the chalet we stayed in.

Stuck in Hell, Norway

My mom and I were stuck in Hell train station in Trondheim Norway for five hours on the first day of our travels.

A nice old man at my work passed away last week of cancer. Ray.
The following poem was in his funeral service.

Not how did he die, but how did he live?'
Not, what did he gain, but what did he give?
These are the units that measure the worth
Of a man, as a man, no matter his birth.
Not what was his church, nor what was his creed?
But had he befriended those really in need?
Was he ever ready, with word of good cheer,
To bring back a smile, to banish a tear?
Not what did the sketch in the newspapers say,
But how many were sorry when he passed away.
Anonymous

Voltaire

"God is a comedian playing to an audience too afraid to laugh."

I don't really know what to say right now, but I'm bursting with a desire to communicate. Thus, I'm using other people's words until I can truly find my own.

A little love...

I am disappearing into poetry once again. Doing some spiritual nourishment. Maybe I'll move some.
Reading poetry brings solitude and peace. It is walking through an art gallery in my mind. I find pace, rhythm and self- observation that is truly my own.

At a Window
by Carl Sandburg

Give me hunger,
O you gods that sit and give
The world its orders.
Give me hunger, pain and want,
Shut me out with shame and failure
From your doors of gold and fame,
Give me your shabbiest, weariest hunger!

But leave me a little love,
A voice to speak to me in the day end,
A hand to touch me in the dark room
Breaking the long loneliness.
In the dusk of day-shapes
Blurring the sunset,
One little wandering, western star
Thrust out from the changing shores of shadow.
Let me go to the window,
Watch there the day-shapes of dusk
And wait and know the coming
Of a little love.

Myself and My Person

Myself and My Person
by Anna Swir

There are moments
when I feel more clearly than ever
that I am in the company
of my own person.
This comforts and reassures me,
this heartens me,
just as my tridimensional body
is heartened by my own authentic shadow.

There are moments
when I really feel more clearly than ever
that I am in the company
of my own person.

I stop
at a street corner to turn left
and I wonder what would happen
if my own person walked to the right.

Until now that has not happened
but it does not settle the question.

Virginity by Anna Swir

One must be brave to live through
a day. What remains
is nothing but the pleasure of longing—very precious.

Longing
purifies as does flying, strengthens as does an effort,
it fashions the soul
as work
fashions the belly.

It is like an athlete, like a runner
who will never
stop running. And this
gives him endurance.

Longing
is nourishing for the strong.
It is like a window
on a high tower, through which
blows the wind of strength.

Longing,
Virginity of happiness.

I am graduated! I did it. Good for me.

My parents arrive on the 31st. No plans for exact return to my homeland. Soon.

Much Love

Man is most nearly himself when he achieves the seriousness of a child at play. - Heraclitus

Wow. I'm a bit lost. It's okay.

One's-Self I Sing
by Walt Whitman

One’s-Self I sing, a simple separate person,
Yet utter the word Democratic, the word En-Masse.
Of physiology from top to toe I sing,
Not physiognomy alone nor brain alone is worthy for the Muse, I say the Form complete is worthier far,
The Female equally with the Male I sing.
Of Life immense in passion, pulse, and power,
Cheerful, for freest action form’d under the laws divine,
The Modern Man I sing.

Sometimes with One I Love
by Walt Whitman

Sometimes with one I love I fill myself with rage for fear I effuse unreturn’d love,
But now I think there is no unreturn’d love, the pay is certain one way or another
(I loved a certain person ardently and my love was not return’d,
Yet out of that I have written these songs).

Forgive my indulgence....

My niece.

I'm in the final week of my last break before my last term of grad school.
In this last term we have no more classes. The first three weeks we are left to perfect and prepare for a public presentation of our best work throughout the year. The last 4-5 weeks is devoted to working on our final projects which are shown in the last two weeks of school.

Without being too dramatic (which is difficult for a performer), it is the end.

I am thoroughly excited. I'm excited to focus on creating work, honing it, playing with it. Essentially I am excited to work at what I've been training in for the past two years. I am also completely buzzing about plotting what to do next. I have my plans in Portugal till October and then hopefully ("grant"-willing) I'll have plans to the end of the year.

*Deep happy healthy creative silly sounding Sign*

Whatever you can do or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has genius, power, and magic in it.
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

My friend Erin, reminded me of a wonderful artist here in London. His name is Banksy. He does graffiti on public walls, you can't live in London without seeing some of his work. He truly is, for me, oneof the most impactful artists I have experienced. He makes stencils and then runs around tagging unused walls and sidewalks of london.








I have included some images of his stuff:

This is from Erin's blog regarding the video below.... (by the way, my US friends, fyi. TESCO is a chain supermarket in the UK, like Safeway or Albertsons)
"Here is some street art that I am enjoying at the moment:
I see this Banksy each morning as I go to work. From the website: "What we find to be most important about the video is the diversity of the people who stopped, noticed, and most importantly - appreciated - the work. The video is a terrific testament to the "value" of street art."

I am on my break from school. I realize I only have two more terms.

The summer is approaching. The sun struggles with the clouds to bring about summer. I am cheering for the sun. The clouds are making a good fight. Rain pelts the sidewalks daily and then the tired overcast clouds, exhausted from pummelling soaked londoners, release their hold on the skies and the sun makes a fine show.

I consider buying a bike. But the schizophrenia of the weather keeps me a spendthrift.

I love to watch people on the train. I love to spin tales of their lives and where they are going. People on a train are going somewhere, oh the places they go! I also like to watch people in queues or lines. Patience becomes physical. Children are fun to watch as well, but I worry that their parents will find me strange.

and I am not strange.

More of Summer with Dad and Grandma,

My new niece! Summer Rose Johnson, born February 20th!!

Boy am I missing the Sun.