Attention Ottawa people! I’m having an indie music concert at my house this summer¹. That’s right, it’ll be an intimate night of folk and rap songs with Shane Watt and Jesse Dangerously. Remember these two from the concert I went to earlier this year, where this awesome and impromptu collaboration happened:

You also may have read about Jesse in an Ottawa Citizen article last month, or seen Shane performing with Krista Muir over the last few years. Well, I wanted to see both these artists perform again, so I invited them to my house. Not only will it be a night of authentic music (with another collaboration, I’ve been told!), but there will be free ice cream, and you’ll get to meet my cat, with whom you’ll fall in love². Shane has also hinted that he might bring a special guest for the night. So come and meet the musicians, support local Canadian talent, and have a fantastic time.

1. Click the picture above to download the invitation. [↑]
2. No, you cannot take her home. [↑]

I finally got a large print made for myself, of the frozen lake from my trip to New Hampshire. You really need to see the original from the entry (on black) to get an idea of what the picture looks like, because the shot I took above doesn’t do it justice as I was exposing for the general area in my living room, losing much of the detail of the picture. At over 48″ wide and 32″ tall, it cost me a pretty penny, but it was oh so worth it.

After some extra tweaking on my end to bring out the contrast, my awesome printer brought out the trunks of the white birch trees in the left forest using Photoshop, adding a touch of contrast and detail. The picture was laminated with a matte finish, so there’s no glass to reflect (and hence distract), from he windows. Then my framer used one of her new framing techniques where she takes textured fabric and stretches it over an inside border (instead of a mat board), then adds a frame that’s smooth but not flat¹. The colours fit right in with the walls, while the border and frame matches the couch.

It’s the first picture I’ve used to decorate the main floor of my house, because I’m really picky about the stuff I put up on my walls. This one was chosen because the sky, the sunset, the ice and the patterns in it, all speak emotion to me, which is what I try to achieve in my pictures, and something I enjoy looking at.

1. This means I sign, stamp, and number the picture on the picture itself, since there’s no mat board to write on. [↑]

Joel and Charlotte agreed to take care of Dolly while I was in Hong Kong. Unfortunately, the combination of another cat, a dog, a new environment, and my absence, stressed her out. She started marking her territory (on their couch), even with her own litter box in a secluded area, so they decided to bring her back to my house, and let Julie take care of her from then on.

I found this drawing on my white board when I got back. Along with an especially affectionate cat, it was a nice little thing to come home to.

Few people in my family seem to understand my art.

When they look at my pictures, they make comments about the quality, or whether or not they’re smiling, or ask how much money I make. It’s never about the meaning, or my intent, or what I’m trying to express. Only one of them saw what I was going for in composing this photo of my grandma and aunt with the poster in the background.

They also talk through my videos when watching them, when every bit of pacing is important, missing significant establishing shots.

Maybe it’s the culture. Very few Chinese kids are allowed to be artists, as it’s seen as too risky or impractical. My generation of family seems to be full of accountants, and engineers, programmers, or anything else with security. Even though piano or violin lessons are common (I can’t think of a single Chinese friend who didn’t take piano lessons at one point), it’s more of a status symbol to be able say that you can afford the private lessons and instrument.

This is probably why I feel like I don’t relate or can’t speak to most of my family. When they don’t understand my art, they don’t understand me.

Before I announce the winner, I wanted give a HUGE thank-you to everyone who participated in my painting naming contest. It’s simply amazing, the number of ways different people can see the same thing, even from different angles. I particularly liked the little bird in the left-hand corner that Julie noticed.

Even though there were a few consistent themes, like flowers, and dancers, the types of titles submitted were widely ranging, from:

…the abstract

• “One” (by Nick)
• “Life” (by Sabrina)
• “We All Do” (by Xibee)
• “Gogh’s Brain Child” (by Servant)
• “Groupies” (by melissa)
• “empower enflower”, “Mondrian Chickens without Wheelbarrow. Hold the Rain.” (by Pearl)

…to the straightforward

• “Happiness in the dark” (by Edrei)
• “Beauty in Black and White” (by Lucy)
• “Daisies” or “Headlights” (by Joe Lencioni)
• “Dancers wearing fedoras” (by Robin)
• “Eruption” (by Lloyd)
• “roadside daisies”, “rocket full of posies and bilities” (by Pearl)
• “daisy Pop Rocks” (by guili)
• “Black-eyed daisies” (by Pelf)
• “An Aerial View of Sufi Spinners Bringing Spring” (by der altmodische, schwarze Bär)
• “flowers and squares” by bya
• “Impact” (by Melanie)

…to the creative

• “Sunny Side Up” (by Tiana)
• “lush brush rush” (by Pearl)
• “A muse, a spark, a dozen(?) daisies of inspiration” (by Jason)

…to the sci-fi

• “Celestial Blooms” (by Julie)
• “Stellar Bloom” (by Steph)
• “silent hill daisies” (by Rob)
• “genesis” or “let there be light” (by John)

The Winner: “stroke of pluck” by Pearl.

I chose this as the winner because of how well it describes the painting to me in such few words, while being wrapped in a clever pun. Congratulations to Pearl on winning the painting! I’ll figure out a way to get it to you this week.

To show my appreciation for all the participation, anyone who submitted a title is eligible to receive a 5″×6″ print of the painting. If you’d like a copy, just e-mail me and include your contact name and postal address. Since I’ll be numbering and signing each limited edition copy, I’ll need to know if you want one by the end of the month so I can figure out how many to make in total.

This is the first painting I’ve ever made. I’ll suffix that with “in my adult life”, because I probably did something with my hands when I was a kid.

Julie, who’s very familiar with the medium, got me to sit down and paint with her. I was able to play around with different techniques of strokes and the like. It was interesting to discover the way the colours bleed, the consistency of the paint, and the texture of the canvas.

It’s definitely abstract. I agree with Dan’s astrology reading, in which he said that I see colours differently, but that doesn’t mean I can create them. Frédéric once told me that it’s easier for him to paint than photograph, because if he needs a certain colour, he can just add it to the painting by hand, whereas you can’t do this with a scene in photography. My forté seems to be in capturing instead.

Painting doesn’t come naturally to me. In elementary and high school, I went direction of music (guitar, voice, flute, and piano) instead of visual art. In university, when I wasn’t playing in bands anymore, I stuck with the written word, and eventually moved to photography and video when that wasn’t enough.

So the painting currently remains untitled. Partially because I can’t put a name to it, and partially because I haven’t decided what it is. Which seems a little silly to me, as my need to create has always come from the need to express. Even though Jackson Pollock once said, “When I am in my painting, I’m not aware of what I’m doing”, his paintings still had a direction, a life of their own, much like an improvised jazz solo.

Leave your suggestions in the comments, and I’ll choose a winner next Friday. The winner will win the painting! Yes, I’ll even ship it to you. The dimensions are roughly 8.5″×11″ (or 21.6cm×28cm).

When I watched Moonstruck in my university “Music in the Movies” class, we studied a scene where Ronny Cammareri (Nicholas Cage’s character) has a date with Loretta Castorini (played by Cher) at the Metropolitan Opera. She takes off her coat, and he says, “Thank you…You know it’s been a long time since I’ve been to the Opera”.

In his face, you see that he’s not talking just about the opera. After losing his hand and fiancée, he’s at the Met, arguably the most prestigious opera house in the world, with a beautiful woman in a black dress, and he’s missed this.

Even in the screenplay, there are set directions for the scene when they arrive:

CROWDS OF PEOPLE in beautiful clothes fill the plaza created by the three great buildings. A glorious fountain filled with lights forms the centerpiece. Behind the fountain, grand and splendidly lit, is the magical Metropolitan Opera House.

Ever since, The Met has been this place I’ve dreamed of attending. Unfortunately, it’s in New York, and decent seats can cost over $100.

So when my local movie theatre started offering live HD broadcasts of performances there, I decided I should go. To fulfill a dream in spirit, if not in the flesh.

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Tiana asked me to take some pictures of her during her pregnancy so she could have a record of what her body looks like compared to the rockin’ body it was before. In return, she posed for some other projects I had in mind.

It was an exercise in colour tones and mood. As I’m getting more comfortable in working with RAW files, I wanted to try my hand at adjusting tint, exposure, saturation, and contrast.

At one point I asked her how to spell “pregasaurus” (a term she came up with to encapsulate her girth), and she reminded me that it was a made-up word, with no commonly accepted way of spelling it.

The media makes pregnancy out to be such a glamorous affair, with designer clothes and celebrity births, that it seems to be deleteriously affecting the younger generation. I wanted to portray pregnancy in a much more casual, natural light. Hence the ghetto T-shirt and the belly sticking out.

Thanks goes to Tiana for not only getting nude for me, but for being so photogenic at eight months through the pregnancy, and working with me on these ideas.

This little vial, along with a few drops of anti-coagulant, is filled with blood. My blood. I needed some for a photography project I’m working on, so I got a friend of mine in the medical industry to take it from me.

Now I’ve both figuratively and literally bled for my work.

 

The third Emergence Exposition was the first summer show. With daylight coming through the house, and the doors and windows open, there was a different mood floating around. People also dressed lightly and in bright colours, adding to the sense of airiness.

Along with the mind-blowing visual artwork, there were performances by Con Brio, a string quartet, and Aura Giles, a modern flutist with huge lungs.

One of the most memorable parts of the night, however, was a performance of an original composition by John Alac, where he tells a story of a man about to be executed, using only his guitar. The number of different sounds he gets from plucking, tapping, scratching his strings is quite amazing, although what really blew my mind was the way he got the sound of a bell to toll at 4:06.

(You can watch this in High Definition on the Vimeo site. It looks much nicer.)

The woman I’ve been looking for my entire life.

Her name was Christine. She was thin lipped. Frail limbed. Not the least bit camera shy, as she pulled her shirt up to expose a breast, like she had fallen on the grass this way and the folds in her clothes rearranged themselves on her body.

Here she is on a horse in the night. Here she is, grim-faced, cradling her son. There was a scar on her neck from a suicide attempt years earlier, and through a series of photographs, you could see the scar heal.

For seven years she was married, before she successfully jumped to her death from the 9th floor of an apartment in East Berlin.

This is someone who understood his art, his morbidity, his need to capture her suicide in a frame, then publish the image of her body on the pavement, looking down from the 9th floor, along with insouciant pictures of a teacup, a playground, a tank, three plants.

And as soon as I had found her, she’s gone.

Should I be happy that she existed? Should I be sad that she’s gone? Should I be punished for comparing the women I’ve had to her?

Is this painful, or beautiful, or both?

I’ve sold 10 of my fruit and body prints so far. Officially, I’ve made a small profit, with the money being used to pay off the debt incurred from the purchase of much photo gear.

When Dan did my reading two years ago, he mentioned that I see colours differently from other people, and that I should try making money off my art.

Back then, I was far from considering myself an “artist”. I used my camera to express myself in capturing memories, not in delivering messages. At the first Emergence Exposition, Nisha would introduce me to people as a photographer. I would add the word amateur as a prefix, but Nisha would correct me and say aspiring. I suppose I’m more inclined to agree with her now. Being able to support myself like this (albeit in a small way) makes a big difference.

The best part of the entire process though, is meeting people. Not just meeting people I ask to model for me, but when I’m delivering prints as well. I get to see where they’re going to hang the pictures, and I get to meet their kids, their parents, their pets, their friends.

Most recently, it was Tiana, who has two dogs, a cat, and a husband. I didn’t get to meet Brent (or the cat) but I’m sure the opportunity will present itself at some time in the future.

The last three months led up to this night.

After attending Opus 01, I knew I wanted to be a part of this.

John, as a true friend, flew from Toronto to be there for the night. Alex, who was doing a medical internship at a family practice in a nearby city, drove there. Even Pearl also dropped by and I got to meet her.

I was so busy talking with my guests that I didn’t even have time to go into the other rooms to see how the other artists were doing. The house was packed with people again, young and old.

Performances

Jacqueline’s second piece was Sonata in A Minor, by Franz Schubert (unfortunately, her first piece was over ten minutes long, which isn’t allowed on YouTube). I found it to be a rather masculine piece, beginning like a sombre funeral march, leading to a journey of bubbling emotion, so it was mesmerizing to see a girl play it with such conviction. Pay special attention to the burning trill at 5:28, which leads back to the main theme.

Misun told me that when she handed Jacqueline a rose after the performance, it looked like she had run a marathon.

Afterwards, Jacqueline told me after she couldn’t stop looking at my penis through her performance, then quickly corrected herself and said the penis picture, which was hung across from her.

Louise plays the harp by feeling only. She doesn’t have formal any musical training, so she doesn’t write any of her compositions down. It just flows from her fingers, and quite well I might add. As a result, her music is semi-improvised.

John kept telling us how not drunk he was, even though you can clearly seeing him downing glasses of wine in this video.

The after party

When the people left and the doors closed, the real party began for the artists, their guests, and the volunteers. Frédéric and Misun broke out the cold cuts, the fresh and fancy bread, the wine, the cheese and we celebrated a successful night. We had been standing for five hours, so it was time to take a break.

When Dan gave me a reading two years ago, and said that I would be making money off my art within the next 15 years, I never would have believed him.

I feel utterly intoxicated.

With a hammer and a ladder, we hung my pictures tonight, carefully deciding where to place each one to balance the colours, the orientations, the shapes, and the concepts.

Amongst the wine and the wood, the kids and the colours, we stopped to admire the art in the house. Adrienne dropped by to share her latest graphic poems with us, along with her alcoholic findings. “From The Desk Of” Penelope was written that day, dense and deep, full of details taken for granted. The words must write themselves, I thought.

Misun and I seem to share a kinship through our appreciation of expression, something I’ve never had with my friends. Not that there’s anything wrong with them, but I’ve always felt like they can’t relate to me when it comes to emotions or creativity. As I seem to be the creative brother she’s always wanted, and she seems to be the supportive sister I’ve always needed, we agreed to be adopted siblings.

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In a recent interview, Frédéric said, in his ebullient Parisian accent, that one of the reasons he wanted to open the Salon is to promote dialogue and interaction. Perhaps it’s this hunger for dialogue that connects us. He also mentioned to me he was stressed out about being interviewed; being put on the spot made him freeze up. I told him I had the same problem with pretty girls. “You’re affected by beauty”, he said, something I knew, but not something that everyone understands.

I left, feeling like I was a part of something wonderful, something greater than myself.