| hello |
[May. 10th, 2007|11:33 am] |
The first thing I will remark is that it is very hot here in Montreal
Secondly I'm having a fabulous time.
I just finished my French resume (c.v) yesterday and am now ready to face the world in this soaring humidity. I am also registered for 20th CENTRY MODERN DRAMA at MCGILL and am super duper fantastically absolutely excited.
The whole job thing is totally nerve-wracking, I walked for 2 1/2 hours around town yesterday, melting. But I feel it will improve - I feel I will find something, even if it's bad. Plongeuse, anyone?
Only have seen James once, I'm not sure what he's doing. Paula has been simply amazing. We also have a guest with us this week so the two of us have been playing hostess times a hundred. I will be lonely when everyone leaves on the same day but . . Makes me wish my course started next week and not in July. That said, those at Playwrights will still be here. My local internet Cafe. Paula has no internet so it's been an interesting experience for me, a secret tech junkie. I can hear her laughing at the staff meeting right now - I'm in the kitchen. One of the staff members here is a beautiful French lady and she generously helped me with my French C.V. I am so indebted to her. I love the staff here at PWM.
Paula is working on a play at NAC, it's by Marie Clements and opens on the 25th. I'm also very excited for that.
Hosting is so fun . . Amazing French Bistro, tie collections, classy martini, plays, and comic books. Soon my ID card for the big M will be ready and I WILL BEGIN TO LIVE AT THEIR LIBRARY
Miss you all. I will call you soon Kathryn J.
KVC |
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| Hi! |
[Apr. 8th, 2007|10:54 am] |
| [ | Current Location |
| | At home | ] |
| [ | mood |
| | awake | ] |
| [ | music |
| | Tom Waits- Hang On St. Christopher | ] |
I thought I would update with a few thoughts:
- I'm waiting for school to end and looking for a job, which I'm sure is the case for thousands of others at the
moment.
- Yesterday I bought a CD called Music for Tourists by Chris Garneau. It was used, which is sad,
because it was only released a few monthes ago and nobody wanted to sell it new. Did I mention Sam's
closed? I guess the music is kinda sucky for a lot of standards, but I love it. Bleeding piano suicide ballads
are just the ticket for me! Yessir-ee.
- Film is a nice class. I think I would like to take film again in the future, although on a personal note I've been
having trouble communicating with nearly everyone in the group. I have nothing to say~! Nothing! But here
are three fabulous films I've had to watch for class:
- Hiroshima Mon Amour
- My Beautiful Laundrette
- The Remains of the Day
- Online folks and my comic. Some hate it and some really like it. I need to find a new font and I need to lose
my precious oblique aesthetic.
- Reading What is the What by Dave Eggers. I suggest you read it too.
- I have started drinking coffee. I am in love with the boy at that particular coffee shop. He goes to
NSCAD, but he'll never see me. Oh no.
- Printmaking.
- I really enjoyed Visual Culture last Thursday. At first I was detesting to do it, but I had a really nice chat with
Kate and the few others that were in our group. And the teacher. It was the first time I'd really had the
opportunity to talk to her face to face. A smart lady.
- Up and down all the time. Should I stay? Should I go away? Perhaps I should take a vow to never say, only
do. So much to think about. And . . .
- KATHRYN AND I ARE GOING TO NEW YORK! Soon. Ah, soon. |
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| happy these days |
[Jan. 22nd, 2007|11:21 am] |
| [ | Current Location |
| | Home | ] |
| [ | mood |
| | indescribable | ] |
| [ | music |
| | Belle and Sebastian - Piazza, New York Catcher | ] |
I must say that I am quite enjoying school these days. It all seems to have settled. Today we are printing our linocuts! My fingers are bleeding!
Yesterday I went and saw Babel [again] and have since learned that the tear inducing music at the end is in fact called "Bibo no Aozora" by super famous Ryuichi Sakamoto. Man, my favorite movie ever.
Various things are confusing me however . . My over the top stresses seem to be subsiding, a boy is confusing me, montreal this summer is confusing me, the direction of my life of course.
Last week I remember I had had one of those all consuming confusing days and I most embarassingly cried throughout the entire length of in the aeroplane over the sea and speaking of Neutral Milk Hotel, I had a dream last night I was back in high school talking to my old sociology teacher about music, and she began singing the first lines of "Little birds," to my shock. "Where did you hear that?" I asked. Then later, in class, my old nemesis Scott M. was there at his desk . . With a sketchbook filled with strange personal drawings that he began showing me. "They're inspired by Little Birds," he said. "Oh, that's such a sad song." I said. "Yes," he said. "And this is a drawing of my father, the father in that song reminds me of how cruel he was." My dream self was very confused at this point, as Scott, in his conservative MP to be suit was acting so out of character. I thought about the terrible content of the song (A boy finds he has little birds growing inside of him, his insane father fears the devil and drowns the boy in the river, after having previously smashed the brains of the boys brother for homosexuality. ------ pretty gruesome stuff.) Then I woke up.
I also had a dream my family and I went on a trip to Japan and got lost in a strange version of Tokyo. We also met Lucy, Kurt and Ally in the airport, who were on their way back from a 1 day biological (I think it was] expedition to New Zealand.
-KVC |
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| skeletons and such |
[Jan. 7th, 2007|11:47 pm] |
The novel I am reading contains the most extraordinary British satire and the author displays observational skills so formidable that even I, who barely know anything about what it is observing, can understand it completely. It's called The Line of Beauty (coke?) And I am not sure what to make of it exactly. It won the Booker prize?
My life-size Skeleton for Intro Figure Drawing is a very romantic one. She has a long scarf and rose petals are tumbling from her raised right hand. It is supposed to be a self-portrait. And well, that is more or less how I feel right now. Romantic for no particular reason (for I have nobody, and have never had anyboy, to feel like that about.) It is a very lonely sort of sentiment.
Laura and I are going to write a musical, if you didn't know. She's into Neutral Milk Hotel now. We can finally be chums!
The latest page of Adrienne Clare (http://adrienneclare.smackjeeves.com) isn't as finished as the others, but I liked the expressions so much that I left it. Rosie's expression on the bottom right panel is why I love writing graphic novels (but appparently never finishing them,) more than everything. |
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| that I wrote down in my ledger . . . |
[Dec. 19th, 2006|01:50 am] |
Well, it's vacation time here in the Vingoe-Cram household, except for mom who's working way too hard in Toronto. But aside from that.
Insofar I've been doing most of the things I said I'd do in my 3 weeks of forget-NSCAD-exists. Read an amusingly romantic book called In the absence of men (Thanks Ms. Johnson,) and stay up late with Walt Whitman biography. The pre civil war period in American politics is a definite learning curve for me. I did not even know that Mr. Lincoln was the first president of the then bran-new Republican party. How times, they change! In the days when before he rose to power, the democrats were a mess of corruption and pro-slavery legislation (Also the 2 party system was crumbling as the Whig Party dissolved.) Aside from the apparent corruptness of federal politics, the governments on a municipal level were atrocious. If you guys think today's meagre Sponsorship Scandal is something to cry about, New York City politics in the 1830s and 40s were unimpressive. Now before and after that period, not so bad. It was particularly scummy period.
O.K. Another great thing for me the past day or so is a sort of rediscovery of Joanna Newsom's music. I never really noticed it before, but she is one spectacular bard. Her new record, Ys includes a long -form, beautifully unraveling song called Emily that I've just had the stunning pleasure of listening too. Infact, all of these songs are quite long and unraveling. One contains 199 lines of verse. The song is about her sister who is an astrophysicist and I wanted to share with you this breathtaking section:
And, Emily - I saw you last night by the river
I dreamed you were skipping little stones across the surface of the water
Frowning at the angle where they were lost, and slipped under forever,
In a mud-cloud, mica-spangled, like the sky'd been breathing on a mirror
Anyhow - I sat by your side, by the water
You taught me the names of the stars overhead that I wrote down in my ledger
Though all I knew of the rote universe were those pleiades loosed in december
I promised you I'd set them to verse so I'd always remember
That the meteorite is a source of the light
And the meteor's just what we see
And the meteoroid is a stone that's devoid of the fire that propelled it to thee
And the meteorite's just what causes the light
And the meteor's how it's perceived
And the meteoroid's a bone thrown from the void that lies quiet in offering to thee
-Joanna Newsom |
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| beautiful day |
[Dec. 2nd, 2006|01:07 am] |
| [ | mood |
| |  thoughtful | ] |
| [ | music |
| | Xiu Xiu - Save Me Save Me | ] |
My drawing instructor surprised us today with a somewhat unrelated talk related concerning world aids day (which is today). He wanted us all to remember the many (artists) that died of aids and various other attitudes we should all shed. It got me thinking. I mean, that history has always sort of been alive in my collective memory, despite having not been around for it, because both my parents are artists and my mother a theatre professional in particular. It's really really sad. It reminded me of my fucked up global history class and all those kids who actually thought Africa didn't "deserve" our attention for being "backwater" when really, this is hypocritical. as 25 years ago a woman in New York City was forced to dispose of her son's body in a garbage dump , which was the example he gave.. We aren't/weren't that much better. God we're such asses! Only thinking of ourselves.
It was obvious that his speech was really moving, because a. it meant alot to him as a gay male artist and inside his realm of experience and b. i think we all realized how important the history is especially especially as emerging artists. I mentioned it to my mother and she is always surprised to think that I wouldn't remember it [how would I?] Because it seems like just yesterday for her. Another thing he told us was that on dec. 1rst they used to drape the Anna Leonowens gallery with black cloth. Not anymore for a bunch of reasons I guess.
It's strange that this is like an almost erased part of history and that's because alot of the people who lived it are dead. It gives a whole new dimension to that song, I Fell in Love With a Dead Boy which is essential about the erasure of drag/transgender history in New York because of AIDS.
~
In addition to thinking about this and trying to "grasp" the enormity of it, today was beautiful because I went for sushi with Kathryn and Morgan and that was so, so nice. I also cleaned the house with my mother to the tune of the Decemberists [very bizarre] and watched the Liberal Leadership speeches like the politics nerd that I am.
-KVC |
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| comics, hurray |
[Nov. 27th, 2006|12:51 pm] |
Well I am quite happy right now. Last night I outlined my comic/novel for real and it has a beginning, middle and end sort of! And many dramatic twists and climaxes. I guess. Well there's stuff to keep you reading. I've been posting it to various webcomic communities to keep me motivated.
http://adrienneclare.smackjeeves.com
As you can see there are 4 real pages! I am working on 5 as we speak and am thinking about how to start chapter 1. And hurray, I have 3 fans! 1 fan an update, it seems. Now someone out there however insignificantly, is wanting me to keep going.
That's about it. I think this journal has basically become art based now. I suppose that's alright. I'm hooked on the xiu xiu song, Boy Soprano. It is amazing.
And my cold is going away at last . . . That's good too.
that really is good. |
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| (no subject) |
[Nov. 12th, 2006|12:46 am] |
Hello, life, public journal.
Well. Only 4 more weeks until the end of Photography! Cheers. But I think I may be starting to warm to it, slightly, except for those all to frequent panic attack - what if's - crisis.
Tonight I did some ushering for Corvette Crossing [they've been getting some nice houses,] but because I do not enjoy the show I sat out and read Dr. Vincent Lam's giller prize willing book Bloodletting and Miraculous Cures. It's engrossing, I must say. His acceptance speech was so moving, I saw it on replay today. Not precisely sure why but . . I guess just because he's so talented and so lucky, as he said. What a miraculous guy. Also I met this very intelligent young man named Michael, who knows my sister [somewhat of a story there] and that was odd. You don't meet a kid who speaks so passionately about the Merchant of Venice everyday. He immediately introduced himself to me and suggested that I turn the play I performed last year into a full length one. Quite enthusiastic, I don't know what to think.
Let's see, what else. Yesterday was so happy, because I went out to dinner with Kathryn, Lucy, Kurt and Ally at the Taj Mahal, and then icecream. It was blissful, especially as our lives are so busy that these moments are especially special and our differing studies make for interesting and always humourous, happy discourse. Plus we had a beautiful model in drawing - not to be vain or anything, but I didn't think such "drawing models" existed except in movies. Makes me can't wait for Intro to Figure Drawing even more. That's sort of like my news that I don't want anyone to know about, because I'm kind of embarassed and modest about it. All I have to say that aside from the fear that people will think ill towards me because of the advancement, I was so so terrified for a few days and had a complete 24 hour drawing ability loss. I know that I can't be so numbed by fear in order to get ahead in the world, and it all boils down to confidence. But I keep thinking, every line I make counts and what if what if what if just one drawing wasn't up to snuff, as it were? Would I be immediately re-evaluated, demoted, reconsidered? 'She's not what we thought she was?'
These fictional conversations that go on without me by teachers/administrators are the primary result of a stressful paranoia... I can't feel proud of the accomplishment I've made because I'm so frightened of losing what I have, and way to hard on myself if I go astray even for a second.
AHHH
Alright but aside from those irrational fears and longing for photography to be over, I'm pretty satisfied with my life right now. Meeting that odd guy tonight reminded me of how I've been betraying my adament love for the theatre and playwrighting, which I'm sure I'll return to if I do end up in Montreal with Paula for the summer, who knows a heck of a lot about plays, directing and my fav word, dramaturgy.
I also realized that all the art I thought or that people tend to think of as pretentious really isn't. art is just, i don't know, so interesting and vast and complex. from hockney to smithson to klein to kollwitz, i don't care. kiefer, zimmerman, beouys (sp?) and so on. speaking of this artist carl zimmerman, he is amazing. go see him at the agns if you can, on until jan 1.
-kvc
p.s ( new comic )
p. p . s sufjan's christmas music, o come o come emmanuel . . gorgeous. |
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| and each feather it fell from skin |
[Oct. 11th, 2006|10:34 pm] |
| [ | mood |
| | thoughtful | ] |
| [ | music |
| | the decemberists - the crane wife 2 and 3 | ] |
The first time I heard the Decemberists new album, I hated it. How things change so quickly. The Crane Wife songs are heartbreaking, especially those about the crane story itself. I had a feeling there was a sad bit to these songs, despite their upbeat, wondrous pop catchiness.
Here is the folktale, more or less. A man finds an injured crane, he takes it in. She turns into a beautiful woman and he marries her. They are poor, but miraculously the crane wife begins to weave wonderful silk clothes to sell, so long as he agrees never to watch her as she weaves. But the husband becomes greedy and makes her weave more and more in seclusion, despite her exhaustion. One day he spies on her weaving, and is shocked to find his wife in crane form, plucking out her own feathers to make the clothes. She flies away and disappears.
Doesn't one find that incredibly depressing? The song makes much more sense now. It's a beautiful song, I think the series is their best.
Aside from the music I've been treating myself to . . I think life has been improving steadily since my dark bit of stress last week, I've resolved to be less self indulgent - and on a more personal note to quite picking at my face. This all because my father is GOING TO QUIT SMOKING. Well, fingers crossed. He knows for sure now he has to if he wants a chance at getting his sense of taste and smell back . . My family needs its fun loving chef around again.
Also I made my first successful photographic print. Check it out at http://marianne.deviantart.com
-KVC |
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