redemption

this idea of redemption actually come up during my art history class last semester. We were discussing rembrandt and his painting of the story of the prodigal son who returns home. my teacher used the word remption and it sort of hit my like a ton of bricks that this word had meaning in my life. i believe in signs, but i dont think that you can understand signs in the moment but just seeing them helps you know you're on the right path. i saw the word "redemption" tattooed on a man's arm whil i was living in colorado, he worked at subway so i saw at least once a month and i just admired this tattoo. the word came up a few more times while i was in denver, especially my confirmation class. it came up this last time when i was back in california but not sure if i was on the right track. hearing the word again really helped me to understand all that was happening, especially after my relationship the idea of being redemeed really spoke to me. redemption to me is not just being saved in the religious context but also the relaization of self-worth.

done

so i finally got my sketchbook and even though i was two weeks late sending it in, it's in. my art is in the brooklyn library preparing to travel around the country with other owrks of art.

the crane on the hill

so my best friend sophie helped me to finally take some pictures of my cranes today! and by help i mean she watched me take pictures :D

fly away little crane

so when i first started making cranes i mailed one to my good friend gabi braud back in colorado. i asked her to take pictures of it as part of my sketchbook project, she finally did and they are absolutely gorgeous

So this one is Gabi's favorite and i thoroughly enjoy it too. i like that it's perched on a railing perhaps to take flight or maybe it just landed?

this one is my absolute favorite and i will be making an extra copy to put up in my room. i have a reason for loving this one so much but i want to write it in a letter for gabi first and then i'll post here.

i almost did not see this one which i like. i feel like all the shots are different cranes with different personalities even though its just one crane. this guy is looking for adventure, he likes to be out in the open and is always on the move for something new and wonderful. but perhaps he's a little misanthropic and tries to fade in the backround so he doesn't have to stand out. he just wants to do his own thing

thanks again gabi for the pictures! i love all of them and will be putting them in my sketchbook.

my mind is chaos

so i've been working on this one mini project for my book. my friend aleks taught me how to make paper cranes (i had the idea to make them out of map paper, re-occurring theme much?) so i made 20 cranes of all sizes and attached them to pieces of string. i want to hang them in nature and take pictures of them to signify all the places i've been in my 20 years of life and the places i will go in the next 20. so i was trying to attach them to a tree branch to make placement in nature easier. didn't work they got all tangled and i spent 30 minutes untangling them. why do i insist on working with tiny pieces of paper on string? chaos and knots are sure to ensue. anyways now i'm trying to think of another sort of base for the cranes, i also need a good natural place to put them and preferably an assistant to help me out. maybe sophie and i can have a crane weekend and she'll help me out. yea so i haven't really made too much progress with that and that's why i haven't posted in a while. also i'm sort of at a loss what to do after that, i just feel that this book is so important, not only is it an art piece but it's reflection, a summart of who i am not only as an aritist but as a person. how i persieve things and interpret them is pretty significant. i'm afraid i won't make anything interesting enough and at the same time while trying to make something pleasing to others i will compromise my aritistic vision. i just have so many ideas

here's my finger when it was all puffy and bruisey

here's my attempt to capture the cranes (hanging from tree branch) in santa cruz. i really like the concept, just need better execution

scans! beautiful scans!

i got my scanner working and man is it some high quality piece of machinery! so here are some fantastic images of 4 pages i've done so far.

here's the first page again.

"there's nothing more attractive than a man in a well fitted suit"

joseph gordon-levitt. i think he is so good looking especially in inception but most of all he's a representation of all men who look fantastic in well fitted suits. which is every man in the world, seriously suits are miracle workers. i like to put things in my books that inspire me or that i find visualy appealing.

"i have extroidinarly small hands for my height and buld"

my left hand. i have a sort of fasicnation with hands, mine happen to be too small for my body not that i'm self-concious about them or anything it's just how they are. when watching movies i like to watch how women use their hands, with their long slender fingers, the way they move them when they speak. if you've ever seen that show gilmore girls, the mom lorelai has wonderful hands. i looove the way she uses/holds them.

massive hope.

these pages where inspired by the feather that my sister found in the park yesterday. i knew i wanted it in my sketchbook but since it's white i needed some backround paper, i like the way the film negatives stood out but felt that they looked lonely too so of course i turned to good old map paper. the photo negatives represent where i've been and the map is where i want to go. the feather joins the two together because it once belonged to a bird who probably flew all over the place, maybe that bird is in the backround of the photo or maybe its flying around the places i want to go. at the moment i'm also trying to perfect my drawings of birds, wings have always been difficult for me and i'm experimenting with differnt types of bird feet. oh and the words on the bottom of the left page are lyrics from an animal collective song "and confusions not a kidney stone in my brain but if we're miscommunicating do we feel the same?"

my wee little finger

so yesterday when i was helping my little sister clean her room i tripped over some of her stuff and crashed into her bookshelf and the way that i fell my right hand sort of collided with the bottom shelf. i'm pretty sure my right index finger bent all the way backwards because for a few seconds i couldn't even move it so i thought it might be broken and instinctivly my first thought was "it can't be broken! i have a sketchbook to do!" i can kind of write with my left hand but to draw for 80 pages, no way. but alas my finger is fine well at the moment it looks like a sausage, it's all puffy and swollen and bruise-y looking. i can't even bend it all the way down my skin is so taught over it. i think by tomorrow though i'll be able to hold a pencil pretty steady