It is cold. It is grey. But, I am actually enjoying it. Weird.
heARTbeatgal
Tag Archives: collage
Early spring?
Early spring!
Not so long ago I attended with a talented pal Ottawa’s Sexapalooza. I had thought that it might be an interesting venue to continue my meditation on touch. I was wrong. I did however predict an early spring by peeking my head outside the giant vagina.
No, these thirty days, these collected images are destined for something else. A blurry vision, a shadow, has hung over this idea from the outset. It wasn’t until a friend, my best, rudely, benevolently, ripped the scab off all my vulnerabilities that the idea sharpened. I am excited to start making this real. I am equally uneasy. I bet that is a good equation.
Dear collaborators: Once again I am in awe of your willingness to indulge my silliness. The photos, the parts, make a beautiful whole to start from. Some are from friends, many are from others. All of them gifts.
Thank you.
So now it is my turn. Give me another thirty days and I will see what I can do. It is behind my eyelids every time I close them. Here we go…
heARTbeatgal
Is it safe to come out yet?
I have been busy hibernating. Physically, mentally, spiritually. February has arrived and that alone is enough to lift my spirits, rev my engine, and ask “Hey, what’s going on out there?”
Now, I am not about to get carried away. It is only February, and while that is progress, my movement remains constrained by the bulk of my snow pants, my mind is slowed by the frozen air, and my spirit is sluggish from the lack of vitamin D.
So by “out there” I am really only talking about a journey as far as my internet connectedness can take me.
Here is something cool, the Google Art Project. This project has put online the masterpieces from the world’s top galleries. Granted, nothing compares to the contextual pleasure of visiting a great work in the flesh, but the ability to access and zoom in to incredible detail on some of my all time favourite pieces from my bedroom or my cube sure is fun. Not only that, I can also create a personalized gallery of my favourites. So far, only El Greco has made the cut.
El Greco's View of Toledo - a total favourite!
When technology, creativity, and collaboration collide in this way it gives me hope that we are on a path that I want to follow.
So what of our technological creative collaboration? The thirty days are almost up. Sunday night is the cut off. I am antsy and need to start working again. I am thrilled with the input I have received thus far, and encourage any others interested to contribute before Sunday.
Peace and love and hot chocolate.
heARTbeatgal
“Mama said there would be days like this”
Me through January's eyes
The image above is a snap I took a few days ago of a very familiar vista here in Ottawa. The sky that night over Mooney’s Bay was beautifully grim. Until this morning, that sky had wrapped around me like a heavy blanket. The moon is waning and a few very well placed words have set me straight.
“Imagination is more important than knowledge. For knowledge is limited to all we now know and understand, while imagination embraces the entire world, and all there ever will be to know and understand.” -Albert Einstein
While watching the “news”, Jon Stewart had as his guest American astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson (a.k.a. the absolute living emperor of the coolest nerds. All that intelligence is super hot!). Mr. deGrasse Tyson quoted Einstein while explaining his passion for challenging the boundaries of knowledge through creativity. While it is comforting when men of extraordinary intelligence acknowledge the rightful place of creativity I wish I saw it more in the habits of the people who run this place. For now, I will settle to fold it more significantly into my quotidian life.
I need to come back inside a while. Do a little creating without strings. The kind that grabs my wrist and drags me running. Blissfully.
And I don’t even like running!
Off and running...
heARTbeatgal
Thirty parts. Fifteen days.
thirty parts
I am cold today. And a little blue. But, that is how it is meant to be this time of year. So I won’t fight today. The moon is pulling on me. It will pass as it always does.
In the meantime, I am meditating on the images I have been blessed with thus far. I am inspired. I worry about doing justice to the enthusiasm of my collaborators, and to the vision in my head. Much more than that, I am hugely thankful for the impact this little journey is having on my life.
Thank you collaborators.
…and keep’em coming. The more the better!
heARTbeatgal
Until now…
I have been reflecting lately on the abundant organic satisfaction I am deriving from my collage. If it feels so natural, so filled with positive energy, how could I have ignored it for so long?
Perhaps I am indulging more than I first thought. I follow @TokyoFashion, and a recent tweet helped to crack the code.
The images to me taste like candy, in the same way that the photos in Italian Vogue satisfy like a fine French wine. (Apologies to the French and Italians, who are surely both offended with this statement)
If collage is understood as, “An artistic composition of materials and objects pasted over a surface, often with unifying lines and color” (My love for you is strong www.thefreedictionary.com), then my deep appreciation of high fashion has certainly filled some of the gap. Highly stylized fashion could perhaps be considered a form of collage, no?
In a recent discussion with Rita Aouad, style and image guru and dearest gal pal, I mused on the genius habit of fashionista extraordinaire, Anna Dello Russo, current editor at large and creative consultant for Vogue Japan. At large indeed! Ms. Dello Russo’s enthusiasm for high fashion compels her to expertly cut and paste her face into the latest and greatest runway and editorial images on her blog. Collage atop collage and dressed to kill. I love it! It never would have occurred to me all these years to sully, say, an Alexander McQueen photo with my mug. (You are missed Alexander)
Instead, in years gone by, in stolen moments, in drab office cubes, I would use the rudimentary tools available to quickly paste together nonsense stemming from some inane conversation to get laughs out of my friends. If I recall correctly, the one below was a reference to a discussion on possible franchise opportunities.
Land of Opportunities
Add to this the Eastern concept of creativity which focuses on, “a state of personal fulfillment, a connection to a primordial realm, or the expression of an inner essence of ultimate reality” and it makes perfect sense that I am here today. Unlike the Western view which demands innovation, production, I have been creating for years. So maybe to mark the impermanence of it all, to emphasize the journey, I should set “rainbow sunshine magic” alight and blow the ashes to the wind?
Wink.
heARTbeatgal
Two hands, two feet, a cock and an eyeball
What more could a girl need?
More. A lot more.
Tell your friends, or better yet, snap photos of one of their parts and send it to us at collaboartive@gmail.com. Please. The vision is forming and we are going to need lots of images.
The anonymity is proving challenging so I have decided to have a sexy man manage the inbox for us so I can keep my distance from the identities. Thank you sexy man
Keep’em coming…
My thanks.
heARTbeatgal
Thirty
It has been thirty days since I started down the path that lead us, for better or for worse, to “Rainbow Sunshine Magic” (the title of CollaboARTive piece number one).
I have always felt a special connection to the number thirty. A little research proves that I am not alone in this affection. It is after all the atomic number of zinc. Also, the age Jesus and his crew hit their stride, as well as, the height of Noah’s Ark in cubits. Most intriguingly though, I discovered today, that by adding up some of the subsets of its divisors (e.g. 5, 10 and 15=30) makes thirty a semi-perfect number! Mathematically speaking, I have no idea what this means of course. I was required to repeat grade eleven math three times before I got it right. Right enough anyhow. Damn you fractions!
So, with its promise of semi-perfection, and the satisfaction of my time well spent these past thirty days, I feel compelled to commit myself, us, to another thirty days.
my hand
This time around, after the deeply personal experience of reaching out to those nearest and dearest, I am suggesting a slightly different approach.
An anonymous collaboration.
Below is the address and password to a Gmail account I have created for us.
collaboartive@gmail.com
Password: thirtydays
To date, it has but one lonely message from me that links us all (ANY and EVERYONE!) to a Dropbox folder.
In the folder, there is one sad and lonely image. My hope is that for the next thirty days, collaborators will fill, anonymously, abundantly, the email inbox and Dropbox folder.
I am asking collaborators to send images of a body part. An anonymous photo of one body part.
In the meantime, I will indulge in a little meditation on the theme of touch that has haunted me for at least six months now. More on that to come.
Ok, here we go again.
Touch me.
heARTbeatgal
Tinker
It is over? Over over? No, that can’t be right. Every time I look at it I see more to be done. Plus, I had vowed yesterday to walk away for a few days, to come back to it with fresh eyes. I failed. So here it is as one terrible picture. When the tinkering is done, I will have my sister take some worthy shots. Then after that, perhaps a party at my place to have my collaborators sign? To see it, to touch it, to hear it (yes, the sound file doesn’t photograph well), to see if you feel any part of yourself in the piece.
I am also going to take the time this week to put in writing some of my thoughts about the project, the process, what the vision spells out for me personally. And plan my next project…
heARTbeatgal
Flickr Photos
TheheARTbeatgal 