The art of shameless self-promotion when you really don't want to say exactly what you are promoting

No sooner have I returned, than I am back en route this time heading south on the well-trodden road down to the town of my birth. Most of my family still resides there, and really, with the miraculous climate, what reasons would there be to ever leave?

I was expecting balmy and warm, but the weather declined to agree and I was forced to suffer the cold in my summer-y party dress and sandals.

Why I am here you ask? Well, two reasons, which is usually how I like to coordinate trips down to my family. The obvious and best reason: Mother's Day. I think it's been and quite a few years since I've celebrated this one in person and my family is a stickler for all things birthday, anniversary and holiday. The other is that I have a short "art" video playing as part of a sideshow related to an exhibition at a rather fancy museum. Well, we didn't make it inside the museum this year, but, for two nights only, the video will be projected outside as one ambles the gardens of this marbled musuem. Hey, it's a free event and they even printed up a nice brochure with some rather studious text:

Lxxxxx Pxxxx and Kxxxxx Gxxxxxx-Fxxxxxxx consider the body as erotic object in Bxxx Txxx Ux. However, in this case. the nude female body placed on display is composed of glistening plastic, as if the constant deployment of the female-as-erotic object finally renders her completely non-human.

Who knew thats what I was up when I made this film in graduate school?

All that she desires

polaroid by Patrick Romero via Amy Stein

I sat there bleeding on the airplane and watching the film about Jane Austen. I could not bring myself to get up and walk to the bathroom and the two, the blood and the film, seemed very much related. Do you know what it is like, to feel blood coming down and then dripping between your legs? I took pleasure in the feeling, in the knowing that without the other, each on its own would have been banal.

The flight had been delayed and I would be returning home late. I looked forward to the boyfriend and I hoped he would bring the dog when he came to pick me up. But, in some ways, I hoped more that the flight would continue to be delayed. I relished the idea of flying around the sky, never touching down, and retreating to some kind of limbo. Limbo was a luxury. A luxury I wanted to taste.

I saw the documentary about Cindy Sherman, an artist I have always admired. As a college student I had a box of postcards: pictures of her earliest photographs. I knew that she had taken the photos of herself, had become her own subject, but the photos didn’t reveal anything about her. Each of these photos told a story, melodramatic and familiar, and at the same time inconclusive. In the documentary, the filmmaker befriended the famous artist and, surprisingly, they end up together. But the shadow of her art and her success eclipse him completely.

On the plane, I closed my eyes and tried to imagine my future. This is what all the self-help books suggest. It is even what a few of my friends suggest. I couldn’t seem to get past what the next step on the ground might look like. Tomorrow? Next week? I felt like an alcoholic in rehabilitation: one day at a time. Even when I tried to envision the secret to my success, I couldn’t get beyond the next day.

There are so many things to explore in the universe and it makes me dizzy to think of it. Like trying to count all the stars in the sky. A Herculean task.

I would like to close my eyes and drift instead of counting. I would like to feel the brightness of the stars instead of seeing. And I would like to know the limitless of the universe instead of imagining.

All that glitters

photo by Brian Ulrich (don't know the title)

I may no longer officially be a blogger. I haven't written in months. But that most likely means only good things. That I am out experiencing the world, that I am too busy to reflect, that I am concerned about other things, for once, than my own miserable existence.

Oh, and I have been traveling. Currently, I am in that famous East Coast City where my film has been screening, and I haven't even gone to see that famous Biennial yet. I am tired. I am broke. And I hate to admit it, but I am kinda happy.

But don't worry, I am still a grump and curmudgeon. I mean, you wouldn't really be able to see a difference from the outside. It's still me.

So yeah a famous filmmaker (yes, I am talking about myself!) at a famous festival with no job and no next film. Not the best strategy for promoting my career. But at least I made it here. The place I am staying is lovely. And the weather for the most part, nice. And of course, every time I come to this famous town, I can't help but fancy myself living here. Especially when it's not winter.

So. Sigh. How dullsville it will be when I return. And how nice it is to feel special-and I don't mean in that special ed kind of way. It does wonders for the morale. Maybe it will be the boost I need to get the next project started. I just can't imagine being at the starting line again.