Saturday, March 08, 2003
enjoying a moment of repose from the strangeness that's come about.
neel's here, visiting from florida.....if he has signifigantly changed, I can't tell. we met up in the evening, before we were supposed to go see John Duncan, but ended up spending too long at a place called "Daily Chow" on 3d and Bowery....fancy thai place, ok food, but they had like 5 different varieties of tea, which was very nice.
so, liza and linda (?) call me up today, and basically, they ask if they can stay here the evening. odd that i'm encountering all of my florida friends at once....saw mike yesterday, and am going to katie's birthday party after the movie ("Chicken hawk"). Such a bad time for all of this though.....i've got midterms next week, and a couple projects due, and i wanted to do some writing.
it was strange.....i didn't have anything to say to the film people that mike was hanging out with.....is what i'm doing so far removed, that there's no common ground?
i'm so interested in the idea of "the south"....been thinking about Faulkner a lot lately, Victor Erice's "El Sur", Ross McElwee's "Sherman's March".....i swear to god, there's few things in the world as attractive as an accent from south of the mason-dixon.....
gotta head off to the library, lots more to write, but no time.
does anyone want to help me make an easily updatable webpage? that might be my summer project. that, and to actually make a nice design for this ugly as hell blog.
neel's here, visiting from florida.....if he has signifigantly changed, I can't tell. we met up in the evening, before we were supposed to go see John Duncan, but ended up spending too long at a place called "Daily Chow" on 3d and Bowery....fancy thai place, ok food, but they had like 5 different varieties of tea, which was very nice.
so, liza and linda (?) call me up today, and basically, they ask if they can stay here the evening. odd that i'm encountering all of my florida friends at once....saw mike yesterday, and am going to katie's birthday party after the movie ("Chicken hawk"). Such a bad time for all of this though.....i've got midterms next week, and a couple projects due, and i wanted to do some writing.
it was strange.....i didn't have anything to say to the film people that mike was hanging out with.....is what i'm doing so far removed, that there's no common ground?
i'm so interested in the idea of "the south"....been thinking about Faulkner a lot lately, Victor Erice's "El Sur", Ross McElwee's "Sherman's March".....i swear to god, there's few things in the world as attractive as an accent from south of the mason-dixon.....
gotta head off to the library, lots more to write, but no time.
does anyone want to help me make an easily updatable webpage? that might be my summer project. that, and to actually make a nice design for this ugly as hell blog.
Wednesday, March 05, 2003
oh, and the photo shoot ordeal was easily a book in itself. if you want details, just ask.
oh my god. drawing is one of the *hardest* things I've ever attempted to do. this class is fucking brutal.....i feel a physical repulsion every friday morning, and trying to do this for 3 hours is blinding agony. i think i understand now how some people feel when they're reading Heidegger. for the evening, i've given up on this drawing of my face that i've been working on for the last two hours or so.....i just *cannot* figure out the right side of my face. it's in shadow, so it's dammed near impossible to first visualize the planes, and then get them onto the page. oh, the agony!
on the other hand, i've found a kindred spirit in the photo program. when he came in the first day, to get a tour of the fascilities, he asked me (as i was working in the cage) about tray processing 4x5 negatives......it turned out that he was using them for pinholes too! (tray processing is *nasty*, don't do it if you've got cuts on your hands, i did it when my hands were cracked and bleeding from the cold, and they didn't heal for weeks.) i think we're going to do a super-8 installation together. he's thinking of using Bergson in his colloqium! if he was a girl i would totally ask him out.
i was thinking of that book "a wrinkle in time" when i was on the subway back home, and it dawned on me that the book had a really, really massive influence on me when it was younger. it may be what spawned my cinephalia. i mean, think about it, the "tesseract", which allows one to join together two seperate moments in time, and traverse the two. i'm amazed that it took me so long to figure it out. they were also really mysterious, and what i felt about them back then is what i feel now about things that are beautiful. maybe i'll read them all over again....but i kinda don't want to have to revise my memories of the books. i still remember the cover to "a wind in the door".....even the titles are beautiful.
neel's coming over tomorrow and staying through wednesday. should be fun....hopefully it won't intrude on studying for midterms.
i'm also attempting to grow a beard. mostly for warmth, partially for aesthetic concerns. i also bought a *serious* stack of books from the bookstore (they were selling new directions remainders dirt cheap, picked up 3 john hawkes books, an adolfo bioy cesares, a guy davenport essay collection and _studies in poetic discourse_) for like 4 dollars a pop)
joan of arc just put out two new albums! i've been tempted lately to pick up some mz. 412 records, because they might be approaching this metal/experimental hybrid in an interesting way.....i'm also kinda in the mood for something xtra evil. must resist.......
gallatin gave me a locker! hot damn!
many more concerns, but i've got to finish this dammed erstfest review....."heard" 5 mins of the muller/yoshihide, but was dragged away by ann and (that fucking lush) wayne to do lots of stupid work, along with coping with the fact the stupidity descended en masse onto the black and white darkroom at the barney building in the afternoon....christ, you'd think that these people hadn't been doing this for weeks now.
on the other hand, i've found a kindred spirit in the photo program. when he came in the first day, to get a tour of the fascilities, he asked me (as i was working in the cage) about tray processing 4x5 negatives......it turned out that he was using them for pinholes too! (tray processing is *nasty*, don't do it if you've got cuts on your hands, i did it when my hands were cracked and bleeding from the cold, and they didn't heal for weeks.) i think we're going to do a super-8 installation together. he's thinking of using Bergson in his colloqium! if he was a girl i would totally ask him out.
i was thinking of that book "a wrinkle in time" when i was on the subway back home, and it dawned on me that the book had a really, really massive influence on me when it was younger. it may be what spawned my cinephalia. i mean, think about it, the "tesseract", which allows one to join together two seperate moments in time, and traverse the two. i'm amazed that it took me so long to figure it out. they were also really mysterious, and what i felt about them back then is what i feel now about things that are beautiful. maybe i'll read them all over again....but i kinda don't want to have to revise my memories of the books. i still remember the cover to "a wind in the door".....even the titles are beautiful.
neel's coming over tomorrow and staying through wednesday. should be fun....hopefully it won't intrude on studying for midterms.
i'm also attempting to grow a beard. mostly for warmth, partially for aesthetic concerns. i also bought a *serious* stack of books from the bookstore (they were selling new directions remainders dirt cheap, picked up 3 john hawkes books, an adolfo bioy cesares, a guy davenport essay collection and _studies in poetic discourse_) for like 4 dollars a pop)
joan of arc just put out two new albums! i've been tempted lately to pick up some mz. 412 records, because they might be approaching this metal/experimental hybrid in an interesting way.....i'm also kinda in the mood for something xtra evil. must resist.......
gallatin gave me a locker! hot damn!
many more concerns, but i've got to finish this dammed erstfest review....."heard" 5 mins of the muller/yoshihide, but was dragged away by ann and (that fucking lush) wayne to do lots of stupid work, along with coping with the fact the stupidity descended en masse onto the black and white darkroom at the barney building in the afternoon....christ, you'd think that these people hadn't been doing this for weeks now.
Sunday, March 02, 2003
damme, haven't written here in a bit:
a little catch up, i found a roomate, a guy named sam, seems like a decent enough fellow. school is getting pretty hectic, i've got an insane lab due for my electronics class that i'm totally clueless about, i've got to catch up on color photo stuff, a presentation due a week for my research writing seminar (which may be one of the best classes that i've taken at nyu, and which i've actually done loads of work for), neel is coming over from florida next thursday, and staying through till the next wednesday. also a reading test for my med. sci and phil inquiry class, which i have done none of the reading for, and crazy schedueles at the new york underground film festival and experimental intermedia (http://www.nyuff.org and http://www.experimentalintermedia.org). also a *huge* self-portrait due for my drawing class on friday. should be an interesting week, lets see if i get any sleep at all.
today, after sam and i finished setting up his futon, he gets a call from this friend of his. i'm off in my room, eating dinner, when he comes over, cell phone clutched to ear. he asks me, "can i see some of yr photo work?" while mumbling something to the person he's on the phone with. i show him some of my queens blvd. pics, which seem to verify something he thinks. he says to the person on the phone, something to the effect of "yeah, he's a good photographer." then he aske me if i want to take photos of his model friend tomorrow. nude ones, that is. i must have replied in the affirmative, and then i talked to her, and i guess i'm doing it tomorrow. because of this, i'm going to skip "sans soleil" at BAM, gotta hit the library, and get some studying done, i really, really, really ought to see Beat Science at CB's gallery, it would be the rudest thing on the planet if i didn't, and i didn't give brian this borbeto picture. i haven't seen brian the last two times he's been in the city, and i feel as though i should demostrate my commitment to the documentary, although i do find my interest waning at times.
taking these model photos is a pretty dauting task, i can't say that i've really taken a formal portrait of anyone that wasn't me, and compounded with the fact that we're shooting in her bathroom, in lighting that's likely to be totally bizarre and really low. ideally, i'd like these pictures not to be expoiltative and gross, but not classy and tasteful either. hopefully i'll get pushed into something interesting; i've got a few ideas. maybe i'll be able to make something as interesting as this picture; http://www-personal.umich.edu/~amishjs/pictures/london/DSC00120.html
it's of my friend amish, and it seems to be from his trip to london/amsterdam. it's a pretty amazing picture.
phil zampino may be one of the most honest, sincere human beings i've ever met. only spoken to him once for 5 minutes, and tonight for like 30, but you can tell when you first meet him. it's really arresting, and even a little intimidating. i must admit to finding the squidco endeavor a bit quixotic at times, but after meeting phil, i can totally understand why he did it. maybe i can convince him to sit for a portrait, i wonder if i can get it on film....
it is 3am, and i should sleep. last movies watched: "Twilight of the Ice Nymphs"- Guy Maddim, "Asylum"- Peter Robinson (at anthology), "Accident"- Joseph Losey (video, at home) "The Outsider", "The Pre-fab People" and "Almanac of Fall", all by Bela Tarr, and at MoMA. will i catch any of the fassbinder retro? fuck. will i profread this? no.
a little catch up, i found a roomate, a guy named sam, seems like a decent enough fellow. school is getting pretty hectic, i've got an insane lab due for my electronics class that i'm totally clueless about, i've got to catch up on color photo stuff, a presentation due a week for my research writing seminar (which may be one of the best classes that i've taken at nyu, and which i've actually done loads of work for), neel is coming over from florida next thursday, and staying through till the next wednesday. also a reading test for my med. sci and phil inquiry class, which i have done none of the reading for, and crazy schedueles at the new york underground film festival and experimental intermedia (http://www.nyuff.org and http://www.experimentalintermedia.org). also a *huge* self-portrait due for my drawing class on friday. should be an interesting week, lets see if i get any sleep at all.
today, after sam and i finished setting up his futon, he gets a call from this friend of his. i'm off in my room, eating dinner, when he comes over, cell phone clutched to ear. he asks me, "can i see some of yr photo work?" while mumbling something to the person he's on the phone with. i show him some of my queens blvd. pics, which seem to verify something he thinks. he says to the person on the phone, something to the effect of "yeah, he's a good photographer." then he aske me if i want to take photos of his model friend tomorrow. nude ones, that is. i must have replied in the affirmative, and then i talked to her, and i guess i'm doing it tomorrow. because of this, i'm going to skip "sans soleil" at BAM, gotta hit the library, and get some studying done, i really, really, really ought to see Beat Science at CB's gallery, it would be the rudest thing on the planet if i didn't, and i didn't give brian this borbeto picture. i haven't seen brian the last two times he's been in the city, and i feel as though i should demostrate my commitment to the documentary, although i do find my interest waning at times.
taking these model photos is a pretty dauting task, i can't say that i've really taken a formal portrait of anyone that wasn't me, and compounded with the fact that we're shooting in her bathroom, in lighting that's likely to be totally bizarre and really low. ideally, i'd like these pictures not to be expoiltative and gross, but not classy and tasteful either. hopefully i'll get pushed into something interesting; i've got a few ideas. maybe i'll be able to make something as interesting as this picture; http://www-personal.umich.edu/~amishjs/pictures/london/DSC00120.html
it's of my friend amish, and it seems to be from his trip to london/amsterdam. it's a pretty amazing picture.
phil zampino may be one of the most honest, sincere human beings i've ever met. only spoken to him once for 5 minutes, and tonight for like 30, but you can tell when you first meet him. it's really arresting, and even a little intimidating. i must admit to finding the squidco endeavor a bit quixotic at times, but after meeting phil, i can totally understand why he did it. maybe i can convince him to sit for a portrait, i wonder if i can get it on film....
it is 3am, and i should sleep. last movies watched: "Twilight of the Ice Nymphs"- Guy Maddim, "Asylum"- Peter Robinson (at anthology), "Accident"- Joseph Losey (video, at home) "The Outsider", "The Pre-fab People" and "Almanac of Fall", all by Bela Tarr, and at MoMA. will i catch any of the fassbinder retro? fuck. will i profread this? no.
