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PARALLEL PRACTICE GOIN STRONG

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ROBO CALLS

This isn’t exactly a “news story” but is relevant in a very similar way. As I’m sure everyone is aware, there has been an increase in robocalls to everyone’s cell phones recently, disguising themselves as numbers with the same area code as yourself. Last Week Tonight with John Oliver just did a segment on Robocalls, breaking down the how and why of their growing infiltration and how to try to stop them - which he proves is a great deal worth of effort if even possible. It’s a great video, very informative, and in the end he reveals a contraption that will send lots of robocalls to head members of the FCC to help “encourage” them to do something about it. Genius move, John. 

Here’s the plot twist though,        the next day, by only 9:30am, I had received 5 robocalls - a lot more than usual - and 4 of them were listed as being from myself! The caller ID said “Sophie” as it was actively ringing on “Sophie’s iPhone”. This happened once before about a week prior, but to have 4 of them call in a row in the span of an hour or two the day after watching a video about how annoying and invasive robocalls are...                                                ...they’re fucking listening to us. 

Anyway, here’s the link to John Oliver, my hero. Watch the whole thing if you have time.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FO0iG_P0P6M 

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Bourdieu Reading

Main points: Tastes, also referred to as “manifested preferences”, are the practical affirmation of an inevitable difference, justified by the refusal of other tastes. Taste can also result in intolerance of those who prefer differences, ultimately resulting in class structures, cultural “ownership”, and individually idealized ways of life. In simpler terms: individual people like what they like, and groups of people who like the same things flock together in opposition of the groups of people who like other things. This was made evident today by my choice to include fashionable crocs as a strong dislike, which Maddie Barger found to be quite tasteful in an ironic way, and so we butted heads. My question about this text is why does it have to be so incredibly wordy and dense just to lay out generally what we already know - differences in opinion lead to tension and clashes among people. 

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a bed frame that I made for myself and transported home by myself and carried up three flights of stairs by myself - an endeavor that made me feel accomplished 

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spring break update

I been going 100mph for the whole semester so this spring break I am doing nothing. I am sleeping and relaxing and nurturing friendships and building myself a bedframe. Will post bedframe upon completion. 

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round robin follow-up

Something I was told to look into after sharing my round robin text of excerpts from Garcia Lorca’s “Theory and Play of the Duende” was Deleuze and Guattari’s concept of “Body Without Organs”, a term taken from Antonin Artaud “which consists of a body or assemblage with no underlying organizational principles, and hence no organs within it,” considered to be a post-Enlightenment entity which can be a body but cannot be an organism. They explain it to be a “plane of consistency which concretely ties together heterogeneous or disparate elements...; the smooth space through which movement can occur. Rather than the unifying principles of a system of organization, the BwO's system of embodiment is constituted through principles of consolidation.” 

This can either refer to the deeper reality underlying whole-constructed or fully-functioning entities, or to describe a relationship to one’s literal body. 

This is not a concept which I have been familiarized with before, and I’m still trying to wrap my head around it, but it is interesting to consider it in relation to the unresolved and fleeting feelings of urgent passion that can surface momentarily in the process of creating or experiencing a work of art, spoken of in the Duende text. It is not wholly there, and it is not in itself an individually functioning entity, but a looming and ethereal space of personal or creative insight through which a body (literally or metaphorically) must act as medium for interpretation. 

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30 bowls I made

21 that went back to reclaim

9 I got to keep and slip, they will be bisque fired this week 

and now on to mugs! the first 4 mug bodies I made today - 26 more to go, with handles, trimmed and slipped by next Thursday!

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free to be myself, thanks to Stefan

In thinking about a person who’s attitude towards life, general existence, and incredibly diverse range of work (with which I have been able to view and interact with on a physical level) somehow gives me drive to be content in feeling myself with unbiased freedom, that person is actually Stefan Scheercook. He is one of the weirder people I have known, but also the kindest and most genuine 22-year-old straight white male I have ever encountered or had the pleasure of knowing. He is excited to share his work with me, and to learn about the work I am making, and to be wholeheartedly interested in me and my life and my interests and my drive. He is a true friend, a confidant, a person who is always taking more risks than me and making weirder work than me which indirectly validates me but also pushes me to work a little weirder, a little bigger, a little harder, a little funnier. He has a dedication to his work, to making in general, that is inspiring to be around. His practice extends into the threads of his life, how he thinks, how he approaches the world. All of these things are an incredibly positive influence to be around, and make me want to be a better version of myself - my artist self as well as my personal self. To be weird and happy and free and little off the rocker. It’s good to be surrounded by friends like these. 

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Parallel Practice

I have dabbled in using ceramics at a few different points in my life, but recently over the past year I really have wanted to start getting into it more. I did a good bit of ceramic work with Elizabeth Jaeger in NY over the summer, but I really wanted to learn how to throw on the wheel, and also to explore more freely what I can do with this new material. So even though I do not need the class or the credits, I chose to take an intro to ceramics class this semester because I really wanted to get a good educated experience working with clay, and to develop a parallel practice with it that I can hopefully infiltrate into my sculpture work in the future. So far, I really do love it, but it is beginning to take over my life. Working with ceramics is in some way like having a child I would imagine. I have to dedicate a large portion of my time to it, it acts up based on the weather, I have to continually check up on it to see if it is too wet or too dry or needs to be cleaned up, and frankly at this point I have been spending more time with it than with anyone or anything else, including my regular practice which is supposed to be of utmost importance right now as I am in my last semester of undergrad. We have a love/hate relationship at the moment, or I am at least developing that relationship with the expectations I have to meet for this course. It is a lot of hard work, but I know that  it will result in a heightened ability to utilize this material in the ways that I want with skill and understanding. Together with substantial support from my best friend Coffee, we will survive this semester and make beautiful ceramic babies together.

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Democratic Exercise

I always choose the same thing to eat for my shift meal at work at Harrison St Cafe - so for my democratic exercise I designed a system that would choose for me what I would eat, and would not allow me to eat the thing that I usually do (a tofu scramble on an everything bagel). The system broke down the menu into categories and numbers which would be determined by rolling a die. To begin, I would roll the die one time, and if it landed on an even number, I would get something off the breakfast menu, and if it landed on an odd number I would get something off the lunch menu. The die landed on “3”, so I had to order something from the lunch menu. Then I chose six things off the lunch menu that I thought I might like, and labeled them 1-6: 1. Red Lentil Burger 2. Beer Battered Tofu Steak Sandwich 3. Super Falafel Sub 4. Falafel Burger 5. Power Salad 6. Soup of the Day I rolled the die and it landed on “4”, which was the falafel burger, so I had the falafel burger for lunch. It was good. I forgot to take a picture of it.