I am making a film. With my brain. Michelle's brain is also there. We are working together.

At first I had a list of little promts for films. I was pretty lost, the only thing I knew I wanted to include was deadpan humor. I felt stuck and unproductive because I'm used to jumping right into the work with fine arts and even acting but making a film needs more stitting and thinking. Grace came to me for advice and anfter giving her some ideas to help her project my mind was flowing more and I was able to go from "vampire dinner" to "dogsitting a werewolf". I then bumped into Michelle who seemed to be feeling the same way I was feeling so we decided to join forces. Working with another person is very helpful when this is the first film you are planning/writing/directing. She helps me not get stuck on some things and move in different dirctions. When brainstorming we were mostly thinking of funny things we can do with our characters, which is fine and gets brain juices flowing but it does not create a solid plot that an audience would invest in. After talking to Luke about our film we realized we needed something on the line for the dogsitter:  a dogcatcher, parents, werewolf wants to kill, etc. We eventually statrted talking about having two wereparents go away on a hunting trip during the full moon leaving their werechild with a next door neighbor. I was a bit concerned about the idea at first. I was afraid we were going to make it so the werewolf's only goal was killing and I feel that would take away the fun of the character. My favorite horror films are not a complete blood splatter fest with stupid cheerleaders but monsters with some character to them. That is why I prefer the older horror films to current horror. Michelle cleared up my worries saying that it wasn't going to be as a was apprehensive about. Hooray for partnership and community!

Right now we have to work on making a clearer got, and once we get that have a script written out.

Ernst Ludwig Kirchner

     When I went with on Mr. Ganes' field trip to the Neue Galerie to see the degenerate art exhibit I was drawn to a painting by Ernst Ludwig Kirchner. The painting was called "Winter Landscape in Moonlight"

    This piece stood out from the others for me because while the others seemed very tortured and emotional this one seemed almost peaceful and pleasant. I do like the very strained emotional side of the other paintings but this one popped out because of how it contrasted with the others. I like the use of colors, especially the pink trees and I really like how he did the clouds. Mr. Ganes is my quest mentor and we were talking about doing a big painting. One idea was to do something similar to my last piece for STAC art another idea was to do an painting in the style of Kirchner. I don't know if I am going to do that yet but I decided to look more into this painter.
    When I did more research I found my response to Kirchner's painting funny because it seems the rest of his work is really sad and extremely emotional.
 
 
     Eberhard Grisebach said about Kirchner that he, " made short explanatory remarks in a weary voice. Each picture had its own particular colourful character, a great sadness was present in all of them; what I had previously found to be incomprehensible and unfinished now created the same delicate and sensitive impression as his personality. Everywhere a search for style, for psychological understanding of his figures."
   The National Socialist German Workers' Party declared Kirchner as a "degenerate" artist. In 1937 a total of 639 works of his were taken out of museums. I find that number mind blowing. To make all that art and for it to be taken away sold or destroyed is such a great tragedy. My heart sinks thinking about it. It makes me want to make a ton of art. Kirchner was expelled as a member from the Academy of Arts. Kirchner was very upset with the events happening in Germany at that time. As an artist and a German having all of that going on would have been very overwhelming.

Sadly on June 15th, 1938 Ernst Ludwig Kirchner took a gun and shot himself in the chest, taking his own life.

 

Directing Team Rocket

     Directing others is trying to shape and mould your actors are your environment to fit the image of this play that is in your mind. Up until recently I have only been a director’s clay to mould but now I have become the hands. I put up a play about a werewolf finally telling his girlfriend his secret, and to his surprise she accepts him. It is a play I liked for quite a few reasons. I liked the humor I got to play around with in the script, and working with a man-dog.
      With a cast consisting of two freshmen there is a fear that because they are freshman and do not have as much experience, that there is only so much hope for how well you can make them. However I was pleased that Jessie and James were very capable actors who took my directions very well. I was worried that I would have a hard time with authority because I didn’t want my directions to make them feel like they can not do something, even if they can not do something. I felt our good relationship made them more willing to do better for them and even for me. I think I was able to get the relationship of the werewolf and the girlfriend to work well. For me, couples can easily go from cute to cringy but I liked how I got to establish that the couple really cared about each other without being over the top about it. Jessie and James would hug or flirt but it didn’t seem embarrassing for me to watch. Also last minute costuming went very well. I cut up a snuggie in the STAC room and made cuffs and even ho glued some of the furry snuggie to the hole (that was already there) in the shirt. I liked how the hat came out, I was not sure if the glue would stay. The tail was also rather comedic. All of that was done in a period!
      One very important thing I learned from directing is making decisions. Although I can be intuitive, I do worry about making the wrong decision. Directing lets me make a lot of decisions and watch them all play out before me. If one of my decisions are not great I can fix them. The more decisions I made the cooler things I was able to find myself in. In some ways I began to trust my own instincts more. If somebody has decision making issues putting them in this place of power can be effective in lessening that issue. I also learned about acting by watching them. Little things they would do that I would notice but they didn’t because they were thinking about the play. I found being the observer I was able to study the behavior of actors that I can apply to my own skills. It is harder to be that observant when you are acting in the play.
    Although I feel I am on the start of getting better at it I think I could deal with the space given better. I could have even better blocking. I have not been thinking as much as I should have about how moving around the space affects the what is going on in the plot for example: using the bed as a goal, showing she accepts him. It reminds me of how when I am drawing of painting I a much more focused on the person or subject but I tend to neglect the background. I never got very interested in landscape but they can change what is going on in a painting drastically.
     I was surprised to find out that things I could say could help somebody. Possibly because I am a senior and they are less experience freshmen they really took what I had to say and thought the things I had to say were helpful in not only making the play better but make them better at acting in general. I have the tendency to assume that everybody thinks they are better than me and my advice is just silly. I was surprised how willing the two were to work, they are impressive kids, I can give them that.
     I think this play worked out quite alright, even though there is always room for improvement. I think we all learned from working together and I hope Jessie and James felt good about themselves. I think I would want to be in the actors shoes next time, I am curious to see how my acting may have improved from this.

idea for myself to look back on later: eggs that transport you into another dimension when you crack them.

 I saw a lot of Easter eggs that looked like galaxies and it made me want to go into its egg galaxy

Six Degrees of Separation

Double sided Kandinsky

  For my AP Literature class I read Six Degrees of Separation by John Guare. It tells the story of how a young con man who calls himself Paul comes into the lives of two wealthy art dealers, Ouisa and Flan Kittredge by pretending to be the recently mugged son of Sidney Poitier. I really like how the play jumps from breaking the fourth wall to jumping back into the story. The play seems very fast paced in a good way. I liked the way Ouisa and Flan finished each others sentences or cut each other off with a different topic. Their interaction with each other and the audience was cool because they would be talking to you together but sometimes about different things at the same time. Then they would even pop themselves back into the story. This is very significant to the pacing which shows what good writing can bring to a play. The play to me seemed very minimalistic (I don't know if every production does it that way but that is how I am reading it). The set consists of:

 A bright red carpeted disc, two red sofas, hanging over the stage a double sided Kandinsky which slowly revolved before the play began and when it was over. He encased the black wall, made of black scrim, in a gilt picture frame and then divided that into two levels… When actors appeared in the upper level doors, the set would give the feeling they floated in the dark. (Guare 9)

This set design makes it easier for the play to jump from Ouisa and Flan talking to you, in their apartment, to Paul in central park, making phone calls, etc. while avoiding major set changes to mess with the pacing.
   I don't know if any of that makes sense the way I am saying but if you want to get what I mean then you should definitely read it or see it if you have that opportunity.
    I find Ouisa and Flan appealing but not perfect which probably makes a character even better. They clearly have their own flaws but the way they care about other people (this is more for Ouisa than Flan) makes them more lovable. Kind of like parents, you know they have some beliefs that you may disagree with or go about things in a wrong way but because the way they care about things that other stuff doesn't make them terrible. That kind of goes along with what Paul was saying about how they are such great parents and how their kinds go on about how they think they are great (this is partially incorrect but I'll avoid spoilers).
   Paul is also a very interesting guy but more because he is mysterious in regards to his background, and whether he really is a good and smart guy (Ouisa and I believe he is, Flan not as much). I am finding it hard to go into Paul's character without really giving big plot points away.
   Part of the project I had for AP Lit I also had to watch the film version of the play and I was surprisingly impressed. The way that the play is written it is very, very stage oriented but the film adaptation took care of that quite well. The pace was about the same as I would expect from the stage production (again I did not see it on stage so I can not confirm this on my own). Instead of minimal set I found the colors to be very similar in one room to avoid much distractions. A quick cut to another speaker in another location makes the speed work and the cut off, jumpy feeling there. Hooray film editing! I also thought the casting was really great. Stockard Channing was Ouisa in the original stage production and starred in the film, Donald Sutherland as Flan, and Will Smith as Paul. Sir Ian McKellen was in too as the Kittredge's friend Geoffry Miller. Channing and Sutherland made a great Ouisa and Flan and Will Smith is an amazing Paul.
  The only thing that I kind of wish the film did was keep that element of connection to the audience (us). They did keep the conversational storytelling element to it by having it told at parties and dinners but I liked how they audience got a sense of involvement but Ouisa and Flan breaking the fourth wall and telling it directly to you.
   Overall I think both reading the play and watching the film was worth doing and will add another entry into my minds library that I will see pop up from time to time. It already has actually! When going to the Neue Galerie they had one of the sides of the "double sided" Kandinsky painting that is shown in the film (note: the double sided Kandinsky does not exist but only as two separate paintings. I also don't know if the same two paintings are used for each show). It is the first of the two Kandinskys at the beginning of this post. I got excited to see it in person but nobody else seemed to get why.  Oh well.

Oh and for those who don't know what the Six Degrees of Separation theory is:
everyone and everything is six or fewer steps away, by way of introduction, from any other person in the world, so that a chain of "a friend of a friend" statements can be made to connect any two people in a maximum of six steps.

Yes this does relate to the Bacon number and the six degrees of Kevin Bacon game.

I'm just a mood ring missing instructions.

My parents were away in Las Vegas over the weekend and they brought home for me a pack of Beatles guitar picks, shirt with the album cover from the Beatles' Revolver, and a mood necklace. Like a mood ring only around my neck. Shaped like a bear paw.

Easily I lost to what each color means but I like look at the colors change. But why do they change? It clearly isn't my mood.

So I looked into it.

The "stone" is hollow glass or quartz with liquid thermotropic crystals. These crystals respond to a change in temperature by twisting. By this process of twisting the molecular structure changes, changing the wavelengths of light absorbed or reflected. Although they are not telling me the mood I am in I think the fact that you can watch it change its molecular structure right before your eyes is pretty cool.

in order from warmest temperature to coldest the colors are:

violet blue
blue
green
yellow/amber
brown/gray
black

Not reccommended for consumption.

   Michelle and I have been working on this very strange art project called "Gross Garden". It consists of us drawing fruits and vegetables with human bodies in strange positions, doing odd acts, implying terrible things. Michelle and I have doodled together adding on to each other's doodle before but this has much more of a theme. We decided to collab with each other by exchanging a look while Mr. Ganes mentioned group work. I don't think it would be appropriate to use this as our STAC art project but we are still having a ton of fun with.

  It is very easy to tell that Michelle and I have a very warped sense of humor. There were points in doing this were we were laughing so hard and people would come by trying to understand why were hysterical only to get confused and walk away. Michelle and I get like this often. things like "little blueberry with flower" get us going. I don't know why either but it does.

  These are something that not only we find entertaining to do but are easy to make so it is something we can keep up with if we wanted to. We feel it is some interesting and simplistic we can put these out for the public to see. We are using tumblr as our outlet. I think this was the best choice because tumblr is a format that it is very easy to share and spread work around. Plus the majority of avid tumblr users have a sense of humor as warped as ours. I think a great examples of strange comics getting very popular on tumblr is the artist Frenums. During the Halloween season frenums made a lot of comics featuring skeletons saying really stupid or punny jokes.
an example:


 If you would like to keep up with Michelle and my madness follow us on tumblr here

Ich bin Praktisch Perfekt.

Lately I have been avoiding work that I find stressful or extremely tedious like annotating a book I wanted to enjoy or thinking about getting ready for college (I am going to SUNY New Paltz if I didn't mention it before). This is not healthy in any way and I do not promote avoiding things like I have been. However, I have made the choice to instead doing nothing but scrolling through the internet or sleeping to avoid things that I will do things that are more productive and beneficial. In this I have been teaching myself more and more German on the iPhone app Duolingo. If you don't have Duolingo I would totally try it out because it is fun and easy and most importantly free (my favorite number) I own Rosetta Stone for a different language and I honestly think Duolingo is better for the price and you can take it on the go. I find myself able to grasp languages fairly well so teaching myself German makes me feel like I am doing some good, creating some ability that may come handy in the future. I have also been spending more time playing bass. I stopped for a little bit because I gave the bass I was mainly using back to my cousins so they can put it in their restaurant (The restaurant is Beatles themed and the bass looked like Paul's). I currently have my dad's bass from when he used to play back who know how long ago (definitely before I was alive). I really have to change the strings or I will rip my eyes out.

Auf Weidersehen!

Do the Macarena in the Devils Lair

But just don't sit down cause I've moved your chair

Don't Sit Down Cause I've Moved Your Chair- Arctic Monkeys

I had quite the adventure this week. I feel like have been all over the place in the span of about eight days. Last Friday I went snowboarding for the first time. I was better at it than I thought I would be but I also go wakeboarding in the summer. I think if you can balance your weight standing on a train you can snowboard. I have a deeper appreciation of the the snowboarders at the Winter Olympics this year. I'll get more into that later. 

I then went and saw Panic! at the Disco with Danielle (it was her first time seeing them)! Had a nice time and even got myself a pick from one of my favorite bassists Dallon Weekes

Then on Saturday I took Julian to the Neue Galerie during the day. Julian kind of asked me to explain things about art which made me come to the conclusion that talking about art is much harder than it seems. At least for me it is. For me it seems so natural or common I feel like saying "well you just paint it" or "just draw it" and I find it hard to point of key details that may help others with making art. Maybe this is why all those how to books about art go from two circles to the Mona Lisa in one step. Hopefully I spoke well enough about the art at Neue that Julian has a better understanding. That day felt like a "treat yo' self" kind of day and I bought myself a book on Schiele and some more Schiele post cards (I have two at home I put on my walls).

After Neue Julian and I then walked through Central Park because I have only been on the corners of it and never really infiltrated it. Clearly nobody thought to put any ice on the paths and I kept falling on my ass every two minutes. Julian never slipped and I don't know why.

Later that night after I departed with Julian I met up with Caitlin and went to see the Arctic Monkeys. It was my first time in Madison Square Garden which seems kind of weird since I have been to so many shows. To be honest I found that MSG was smaller than I thought it would be. The only arena I have been to was the Barclays Center which is huge! I also got seated tickets which I don't normally do but I was very close to the side of the stage. Who opened for Arctic Monkeys but none other than Deerhunter! Poor Bradford Cox had the flu but they still performed well (heard a few songs we did in Metamorphoses). HOLY COW the Arctic Monkeys are really something. After years of listening to all their songs I finally got the chance to see them live and boy they are worth seeing live. Their most recent album AM  in my opinion was probably the best album released last year. While some of the bands I listen too put out records I enjoyed I none of them I can really say were their best or just as amazing as the rest but AM is a really solid album and I recommend you all listen to it. They have both great music and lyrics that are clever and pretty snarky. Listen to a few of their songs and you'll know exactly what I mean. They even covered a Beatles song to honor 50 years since coming to America. I kind of think Alex Turner's speaking voice sounds like a Beatle, not just because they're English. Alex Turner always sings with a noticeable English accent so maybe I can consider singing along as practicing for the play (however I don't think I'll use an accent from Sheffield, England). Overall they put on a great show with excellent imagery. The whole imagery for this album is very cool from the album cover to this video (watch this, it gave me some cool ideas maybe it will give you some too. Gets interesting around a minute and a half):

One of my favorites off of AM:

Here is their cover of "All My Loving" by The Beatles

hope to see them again soon

Asking and Begging

So I was looking through my twitter and came across a reply Gerard Way made to Amanda Palmer. Looking for context of two very cool people conversing I looked at Amanda's original tweet that contained a blog post. After her TED talk (the one we watched in class) she said she had been contacted by a few publishers and she is now writing a book and "it’s definitely going to have a lot of ME in it, and presumably a lot of YOU."
So her first question was:


to which Gerard Way replied with

 

and I like that answer a lot.

Do you have an answer of your own?