Friday, October 24, 2008

walls, beds, teas and the fugees

spinach (washed and free of nasties) + e.v.o.o. + salt (kosher? iodized? it's your choice really) = delicious

better if it's arugula though.

i've been thinking a lot about walls and spaces. spent a lot of time on walls and why we put things on our walls. i've concluded (though not exclusively) that we place things on our walls to validate our existence and interests. family photos, diplomas, paintings, etc. i mean really, we wouldn't put our divorce papers on our living room wall. or a photo of the first time we got jumped in the park as a kid. it made me think of graffiti and how it's the antithesis of controlling ones space/environment, or organizing it to validate oneself. and it's been a hard thing to grapple with while currently working on a body of paintings. what place does my work have in a greater discussion? knowing that they will reside on a wall space, what does my work need to do to jump off the wall and attack the viewer with questions? i don't want my work to validate. i don't profess to have answers and i never want to. i want my work to be filled with questions that provoke further questions. i'm not really interested in answers to the questions i really value. i feel, they are unanswerable.

space. so yes, space is what i'm currently sifting through right now. literally and mentally. (well i guess with every "-ally", i am mixing through space.) going off of my works immediate location (wall space), i move to the bigger space: the gallery (hopefully? not sure if this would make me happy or depressed). what defines a gallery space. i mean, for all i know its as much a "white square" as mental hospital as prison cell. so what happens in a gallery? we put things on the walls, in the middle of the room to circumnavigate, and occasionally a performance will be had. sounds like a bedroom to me. photos of family, paintings, a bed to walk around and trip onto, which also doubles as the performance space of sleep, sex and waking up. i do realize that i am oversimplifying; i'm sure there's more you can do on a bed.

i was talking to my mom on the phone tonight and in the middle of the conversation, my tea kettle started screaming at me, so i set the phone down next to my computer. when i came back to pick up the phone my mom goes...

" is that RAP i hear? do you listen to that?"

"rap? yes i actually listen to all kinds of music mom.."

"that's not music. it's noise." (NOTE: this is an improvement; when i was in middle school, it was "filth", now it's just "noise"...)

"mom, it's just as much music as country as folk as rock as...it's lyric driven music..."

"no. no. no...it's noise" then an awkward conversation change onto the topic of her visit to see MoTab rehearse. fun times mom. fun times....it reminded me of the time she wouldn't let me buy TLC's "crazy.sexy.cool" because of the word "sexy" in the title. i was devastated. i wasn't allowed to go chase waterfalls in my room. i had to wait until sleepovers.


i need a massage.

meow.

i'm glad i have only a tea kettle to scream at me. it's the perfect alternative to a child. a puppy and a tea kettle.

5 comments:

Chris Almond said...

not weird at all. that was very kind of you to say. makes me feel good. takes away my free agency, so it is evil. i like your blog too. you are cool. let me know when you visit and we can drink tea and read my blog together.

allyson elizabeth said...

My mom wouldn't let my brother buy a "Bare Naked Ladies" CD although there are no ladies, and also he bought "Californication."

isaac isak icekick said...

hello,. im chris' friend , i like the questions you ask in this entry. I also like the whole mom/culture divide issue. I recently blogged about the two issues of wall space/values and my mom and are cultural differences. I might suggest a good book about the whole Art/space discussion, a book aptly titled "Real Spaces" by David Summers. It's supper long, like 1000 pages or so and I can't say I've read it all, but there is so many chapters that you can just skim to the ones that are applicable to your interests. It's one of my top favorite art theory books, well written and full of ideas that really open you up to think about things differently.

Chris Almond said...

that was an awful big question you asked me. i don't know if i have any thoughts. could you make it more specific? then maybe i would have some thoughts.

lia said...

morgie, when you have a minute, you may have heard me talk about robert ryman's works:

http://images.artnet.com/artwork_images_826_275220_robert-ryman.jpg

also: i think the act of putting something on a wall makes it somehow sacred - forces us, in a sense, to worship it - which is why i love the idea of something on a wall that might shock us, like consciously created kitsch or a painting made out of animal crap or framed nothing, like the link above. i definitely think we should play on what actually ends up on the walls of our homes and work and schools, or play on nothingness, literally or through meaningless images.
is that its own glorification? does pasting up a used plastic cup mean that we are exonerating trash?