more drawings

Here are six of the drawings I was scrambling to finish over the past few weeks. I drew nine total, but didn't scan in the last three, which works out well because they would totally give away where I essentially grew up. I guess that statement is silly because I'm assuming I still have full anonymity here, but it's fun to pretend!

What else can I say? Three of these are schools, one is a park, and two are historically significant landmarks. The three I omitted are of yet another two schools, and a very special garden.

I had a lot of fun drawing these! I feel like I honed some skills on this exercise, but could further improve on values, texture, and not outlining too much/trying to include everything. My favorite trick was taking a break from architectural elements to focus on foliage and plant matter, and when I tired of that I would go back to the building with fresh eyes. I had many a night that I would groan in frustration every hour on the hour, but it's the good frustration, the one where you know you got yourself into this situation and it's all up to you to pull through and own up to your project and deliver it as powerfully as you can. Yes, it felt like undergrad studio again, which was 1000x more difficult/complex than this, so...by those standards, this project was no sweat.

by the way

you, I still miss.

analog blogging

Over the last few months I've taken to writing my thoughts down in a real journal again, when pouring out a river of personal thoughts is scandalously (hah!) inappropriate for the blog, or when a listening ear is hard to reach. I'm finding it increasingly difficult to depend on others for support, which is NOT to say I have crappy friends or acquaintances. I get that everyone's got their own thing going on (especially as most of the people I'm referring to are in their twenties), and it isn't that simple anymore to grab a close friend after lecture/studio/work and have a meaningful chat/heart-to-heart/venting session. And even in the face of others, sometimes I feel a little self-conscious about discussing certain issues, in fears of sounding like a whining, self-centered, immature adolescent. It's a little disconcerting when I can provide solace or advice to someone else when I feel like I could use more control over my own problems.

I may be being a little harsh on myself though. And I'm definitely being hypocritical/contradictory in talking about the trickiness of meeting up with others, when I've managed to meet up with J twice in the last several weeks. (I am very much being the unreliable narrator here, bear with me.) In our discussions J and I noticed that one trait we both share is being extremely critical of ourselves, and having high expectations for ourselves in every endeavor or task we're given/set on achieving. I don't mean to sound so lofty in that statement - I'm know a ton of people are like this. My point is, upon going back and forth in our conversation, she and I realized, from taking a few steps back and looking at ourselves, we are doing fine; but out of wanting more, faster - dissatisfaction quickly sets in, and all we can focus on is what can be improved upon.

Angsty thoughts aside, the act of slowing down and putting my rambling down to paper is really soothing. Sometimes when I feel like it I'll doodle a sketch alongside the writing. Some days it's a sketch and nothing else. I try to do one every day, but realistically it's more like every couple of days that I get something substantial down, when thoughts have been brewing and bubbling and are ready to boil over. Some days I know nobody really cares to know about a blooming bud of mine, or another tired criticism of L.A. culture, or that I think of and miss someone way more than I can bear to admit.

I'm alright though. These words reek of self-pity and despair, but I'm not as sad or bitter or negative as I seem. Maybe I'm taking myself a little too seriously, sure, but that pendulum of mine takes mighty swings between being utterly goofy and inane to almost Dostoevskian depths. I'm laughing at me too, now. Sometimes all it takes for me to snap out of this is to make fun of myself/let it all out. :)

ojo de dios

I'm happy to say I've finished a drawing project that consumed my life over the past two weeks, that I COULD have finished well in advance earlier in the year, but as I seem to be a creature who seems to function the best when feeling the direct flame of a deadline at my heels, I fell back into old habits hard and cranked out nine pieces in a little under two weeks. I think I averaged about four hours of sleep every night last week, it felt like undergrad again. But I did it (cue hearty exhale).

Saturday morning I tried to sleep in, but that didn't happen so I gathered up a few bundles of fibers, an "X" of olive branches that I had prepared weeks ago, and an old thrifted instruction book on the Huichol craft 'Ojo de Dios' or God's eye. I resolved to make one for myself to put to rest an old desire from third grade, which was the year in elementary school that we learned about Native Americans. For some reason my class was the only one out of four that didn't get to make those popsicle-stick-and-yarn woven crosses.

I'm glad, thirteen years later, I did it this way though. I'm pretty sure as a third grader the deeper meaning and significance of this project would go right over one's head - but who knows. I'd be lying if I said I felt deeply spiritual while weaving the God's eye, and I certainly did not have an extended prayer that I recited as the weaving formed. But I got the same contemplative peace in assembling the God's eye that I do when I knit - something about the repetitive motions and the gradual building of knots to form a larger whole is extremely soothing. I felt meditative and peaceful winding lengths of colored twine on the wooden frame, even though it was a relatively quick project. I finished the God's eye off with a knotted loop, and hung it above my kitchen door on the threshold of the living room.

It's a little odd to feel this small relief at having completed this craft that I had longed to do as an eight year-old and never really got around to until the pieces started falling into place. I wasn't consumed by the desire all these years either, it faded away and was nearly forgotten, but small steps - finding the Ojo de Dios book at the thrift store, having some dried out olive twigs from my tree at home, and seeing these natural fibers in the glowing colors of the sun at another thrift store slowly but surely pushed me towards the right direction. Seemingly unrelated, yet totally relevant to this fulfillment of old childhood dreams, was finding this large, whole cowrie at El Matador last month. Granted its gorgeous gloss is gone - whitewashed and eroded by the sea to look more like bone, but it is unmistakably a cowrie. And in the way that 8 year-old me would be so happy to know she'd make a God's eye down the line, 9 year-old me is thrilled that she found her own cowrie on the beach instead of buying one from the store. So here's to attaining lost childhood goals, all along the way to actualizing current, adult ones.

construction observations

Framing hammer standing in as paperweight on a blustery day. 

Chalk dust for marking/labeling. 

Ready to go! Self explanatory. 

All three of the birds, plus a boom concrete pump. 

Measuring tape atop a finished concrete floor. All of that finishing is still done by hand, no machine that can do this with that kind of finesse.

A welded rebar "mystery burro" of some sort...I want it.

Lunches! I love imagining what kind of glorious/enormous meals the workers likely pack for themselves every day. 

Bonus snapshot! Me in all my PPE (personal protective equipment).