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fiction-in-my-blood · 4 years

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The Bewitching Hour Part 1 (SITS Smut) Kyohei x MC

I’m thinking of turning this into a series with all the guys in it, so if you enjoy, stay tuned :)!

Warnings: Fingering, Sex

~~~~~~

Work had been trouble lately. Not only was the ghostwriter severely struggling with doing her own job, a lot of the Revance members were on edge because of it. Takashi’s Demon Mode had been making more frequent appearances and many worried for their own safety, few also worrying for the only woman in the house. Not only that, The morning the producer woke up, there was a stranger in their kitchen.

“Who the hell are you and how did ya get in my house?” Kyohei roared at the half naked, rejectfully majestic man that stood at his fridge, peering at the contents like they were going to put themselves together for his breakfast. The man didn’t seem much phased by the shock of one of the inhabitants of the house that wasn’t his, he found it amusing, that showed on the smirky, mysterious grin that appeared on his face when he turned around.

“Hey, man, don’t worry about it, I spent the night.” The admission did nothing to ease Sir Kyo’s suspicion, instead making him more pissed off in the early hour. No one would be a morning person if this is what they had to deal with first thing.

However, before he could argue, demanding him to explain, a high whine came from the far end of the room. “Mitsu~, I told you not to come down until I was ready.” The strangely provacative yet shy call of the young woman, merely dressed in an overbearing sweater and shorts, hair a mess after the activities she had partaken in the past night, shocked the other resident.

“But, my dear, you were taking too long. I was getting a different type of hungry.” The man, surely older than her but a gentlemanly youth about him, cooed, a teasing smirk forming on his lips as he remembered what he had been hungry for only a few hours before this conversation. Masami blushed.

“They call it a walk of shame for a reason, Mistu. Get your stuff before anyone else wakes up.” She crossed her arms in defiance, the brunt of her configuration halted by the notebook she held in one hand. Kyohei recognised it as her writing journal.

“Okay, I guess I can get dressed. Unless you want to keep something for future uses?” The man with fair hair long enough to be pulled back into a long pontail sauntered over to the ghostwriter, leaning over her to steal her lips. Before he could catch them, however, he was blocked by a wad of paper.

“No kissing, Mitsu. It’s in the agreement.” She sighed, almost exhausted with having to remind him all the time. The roll of her innocent eyes didn’t go unnoticed by the slightly distracted producer.

“Hello. What the hell is going on here?” A little pissed with having such a rude introduction, Kyohei made himself known to the couple. The fact he would soon learn about some of her stress relieving habits brought a blush to Masami’s cheeks, trying to hide them with her hand as Mitsu chuckled to himself beside her.

“I-I have those lyrics done, Kyohei. Read through them when you’re ready!” The ball of red quickly made her exit after slapping her notebook on the coffee table in the living area. Mitsu couldn’t help but enjoy the sight Kyohei would usually also be happy to see.

“There’s nothing to fear, sir. Just a trade in professions. You may like the use my services too one day.” With the way Mitsu’s been acting in this extraordinary scenario, Kyohei couldn’t tell what he was suggesting. What was this man’s profession and what did it have to do with Masami?

“If you’d like to see my portfolio, I’d love to comission if you find it desirable.” Only now did Kyohei spot the large art pad held to Mitsu’s body with his arm as he continued to rest his hands in his pockets.

“You’re an artist?” Kyohei, significantly cooled compared to moments ago, grew slightly curious to the man’s offer.

“And Miss Mami is my muse, and I her’s. We arranged it years ago.” The nickname rolled off with such ease it showed how close the two must be. Kyohei almost felt jealous just talking to the man.

“Show me.” He demanded, wanting more to see what had impressed the girl so much to have the obvious relationship they had together. This made that mirthful chuckle reverberate from Mitsu’s chest once again. Despite the clear irritation on the producer’s face, he placed his sketchpad on the kitchen counter and opened it up. Kyohei’s eyes went wide at the images before him.

Pages upon pages of naked women, mostly Masami, framed in comprimising positions, always a lewd look in their eyes. The drawings seemed so realistic, Kyohei almost felt like he was there when it was created, even if they were just sketches- mainly black and white. The one that really caught his eye was the masterpiece on the back page. It was Masami, on her back with her knees pressed to her chest, feet up and vulva on full display. He looked away, an intolerant blush surfacing on his cheeks.

“I’ll say, my most recent piece is my favourite. Masami surely was in her creative flow last night.” A look of pure pride overtook what his usual expression seemed to be as he gazed upon the picture of his business partner. She seemed too innocent most of the time, it was only Mitsu who ever got to see this side of her.

“Creative flow?” Kyohei was drawn by the odd explanation for such a drawing, his gaze following the man as he ripped the page out with little regard to his other pieces.

“You don’t know of her Bewitching Hour? And how long has she lived here?” A tone of pity mixed with amusement filtered out of his mouth as he placed the sheet of paper on the counter before closing his book once again.

“Like any woman, Masami is a powerful being. Sometimes her talent gets too much for her and she can’t seem to let it out at all. She gets so pent up sometimes, I’m man enough to admit even I can’t satiate her creativity.” Mitsu laughed on the memory of an irritated Masami climbing off his lap with a heavy sigh of not being able to pleasure herself with his body. He didn’t mind, he had those nights too, it was the joy of their agreement that made him so confident in his abilities.

“But what’s a Bewitching Hour?” Kyohei was beyong interest by now. For months he had wanted to her his hands on the innocent cutie that lived under his roof. This might finally be his chance.

“It’s just my term for it. She does her best work, in the bedroom and in her songs, at night. The only way she can filter her ideas is in the act, as one would say. On nights I can’t get to her, she’ll desperately play piano. I’ve never heard it myself, but I’m sure its beautiful.” A mesmerised look drifts into Mitsu’s eyes as he imagines all the dirty scenarios he could get into if he could just catch her off guard in one of her musical trances.

“Remember, if you ever hear music in the dead of night, the Bewitching Hour has begun.”

~~~~~~

Several days after the mysterious and mature artist escaped the Revance home without being spotted by any other members, Kyohei has gotten very little sleep. Mostly from anticipation to hear any type of tune drifting through the halls and some due to the thoughts that clouded his brain. How would he initiate such an occasion? Were her trances even a thing? Would it be right to take advantage of that to experience the feelings he’s been waiting so long to feel? Maybe yes, maybe no. It all depended on her, really. If he showed up, made himself known, and she just happened to jump on him, he wouldn’t stop her. Even if she needed a little coaxing, he would be happy to take the place of her muse if for a night. He just wanted to encounter what he had heard, and seen in still images, was so magical.

Then, on one fateful night, a jolly tune bounced in the distance and Kyohei shot up in bed. Where or who it was coming from didn’t matter as long as who it was he hoped it would be. He grabbed a shirt just in case this didn’t turn out how he had hoped and stormed out the door.

In the hallways, following the strangely enticing sound to what must have been from the recording studio, the darkness and tune was a little eery. It was upbeat and fun, but the emptiness of the halls and the hyperawareness that everyone was asleep made a suspicious shiver run up Kyohei’s spine. Please, please don’t let this be Takashi.

Sure enough, through the door that was standing open, was a risquely dressed woman, her fingers jumping along the keys of the keyboard in their in-home recording studio. She was in her pyjamas, a worn tank top that must have been from her teenage years from the cute character on the front and shorts of a different design but just as old. Her hair was up in a rushed bun, sagging to the side when she tilted her head in frustration. Her ideas weren’t flowing the way she wanted them to and Mitsu was in Osaka for an art showing. She had no other outlets.

Except for the man that now stood directly behind her. She didn’t notice him at first, too wound up in her musical whimsy until she felt a warm pressure on her shoulders. She jumped, the electric instrument groaning with a clatter of keys as her fingers slammed down at the unexpected sensation.

“So tense. You need to relax if you want to get your work done in time not to get punished.” A tone she was all too used to breathed on her ear as Kyohei leaned over head, the feeling of his erection pressing into her back. Not that she could feel it, she was too stunned as to why he was here and too busy trying to bay her urges. No matter who it was, she would go for anyone in this state. Before she had met Mitsu, she would go on the prowl in less that suitable establishments, usually mistaken for a prostitute, even though she was the most dressed person on the whole block. Although, it didn’t matter to her, she usually got what she needed.

“Help me then.” The demanding tone spurred Kyohei on, the stern look making him chuckle. She looked as frustrated as Mitsu had made her sound and that led him to believed that this could happen. That he could get what he want. What they both wanted- for whatever different reasons.

Slowly but directly, Kyohei’s fingers from one hand drifted over her bare skin, along her collarbone and arond her neck, making her look up at him by tugging lightly on it. From some of the sketches in Mitsu’s book, she liked and was a frequent user of positions like these. Masami gulped at the heat that suddenly flooded in her.

With that slightly startled but so heavily lustful look in her eyes, Kyohei continued, inching his other hand down her chest and under her top. She moaned the second he tweaked her nipple. Both of their hearts raced at this less than innocent act taking place in such a common area of their home. Masami didn’t think about it, too caught up in trying to filter through the words flying around in her head, but Kyohei was metaphorically shitting bricks. If someone came in, would it be his fault? Would she get angry? The sound of a whimper pulled him out of those thoughts though.

“K-Kyohei, ca-can you... Can you finger me?” The forwardness of Masami’s words and the pleading look in her eyes as he held her face up to meet his gaze caused a shot of arousal to fire through Kyohei’s body and he wasted very little time in pulling her up. He quickly looked around for a surface to lay her on, but there was only the couch and the office chair that didn’t have any important equipment on it, so he pushed her onto the ground, laying her legs over his as he leant over to her. His hand was no longer around her neck, instead both were either side of her head, holding himself up over her.

With her hair sprawled out around her, pale wrists settled close to were his hands were, eyes slightly wide at seeing him in this position and cheeks flushed with desperate but embarrassed need, Kyohei had never been more turned on by any other woman. Masami wasn’t anything special. She didn’t have the ‘perfect’ body or have the greatest make-up skills. She was slow and at times absent-minded, just like right now, she seemed to be concentrating on something else and Kyohei didn’t know that this was what she was usually like in the moment. She was concentrating on her lyrics.

But Kyohei didn’t want that. He wanted all thoughts on him.

So, sitting back onto his heels, he focused all of his attention to her lower half. Palms falling on her knees, which only now had he realised were slightly bruised and was sure they were from the last time she had done something like this, his hands crept up her legs. The warm sensation on her body, chilled by the cold room and limited clothing, sent an excited shiver through her- dispersing any thoughts of music to the side, just for now, just so something could make sense. There was Kyohei Rikudoh, having her straddle him while she was on her back, making his way to her nether region with a look that seemed a little too excited.

But, Masami didn’t have time to think that fact over as she felt some sort of pressure on her clit. She gasped out a moan as she looked down to see Kyohei’s thumb disappearing underneath the fabric of her shorts. The motions on her fastened the more she moaned but the second she got a little louder, it was gone.

But only for a moment. Masami was about to complain before she felt that same digit enter her fully. Although shorter and thinner than some men she’s had, Kyohei’s thumb worked wonders on the nerves that were building up in that area and the nerves that had been in her head for the past few hours. He enjoyed the silent gasping as he pressed in different directions before slipping out and replacing it with his middle finger, once again seeing that short burst of annoyance before her lips parted to take in enough air to remind herself to breath. He wanted so badly to trap those plump things under his, exploring her mouth like it was the Mariana Trench, so, he leaned in.

“No.” A muffled call escaped Masami’s lips as she covered them with her hand, protecting herself from his advances. He stopped his thrusting fingers, wondering if he had hurt her, but she shook her head.

“N-Not on the lips.” She stuttered, the darkest blush she’s had tonight ligthening her face as she kept her hand there. Kyohei was slightly confused, his brows frowning at the strange demand. She would let him fuck her, but she wouldn’t let him kiss her? Well, he knew she was strange, but he didn’t believe it when she had reprimanded Mitsu. He thought it was just because he was there.

“I-If that’s gonna be an issue for you...” Masami led off as she sat up, inched herself away the best she could to keep the distance away from their faces and his fingers, which he hadn’t realised where still in her, slipped out. She bit back a moan at that, too embarrassed and scared to have annoyed him to make a noise.

“No, it’s fine. I’m not going to force you.” Kyohei smirked, wanting this more than he wanted to exercise each of his fantasifull whims. Masami’s shoulders eased at that and her gaze wondered down his body.

“Oh?” She muttered at the tent she saw pitched in his shorts. They were loose and thin, something like basketball wear, so she could definitely tell most of that height wasn’t material. She was in for a treat tonight.

With the tilt of her head, she reached forward, pulling down his waist band and helping his cock escape before he could say a word. To his surprise, he panicked as she grabbed it with such gentle fingers his hands flew behind him to keep himself upright. As her knees weren’t hooked over his anymore, she could sit on her own legs as Kyohei’s crossed his in front of him.

Masami knew what she was doing, she had a routine. Something she knew worked every other time she had done this act with someone new, so, she leaned forward and kissed the tip of his dick before licking it.

“You’re rather forward, huh?” Kyohei tried to regain his usual composure as the petite woman before him hardened him so suddenly he worried there’d be no blood left in his skull. She looked up at that incredulous smirk and couldn’t help but blush as she realised what she was doing.

“I want this.” She replied bluntly, not blaming herself for her less than ordinary ways to relieve stress. She licked him one last time before she brought her lips right next to his ear, careful not to let go of his cock. “So, will you fuck me now, Sir Kyo?”

Her questioning tone was almost innocent if not for the words that spilled out of her mouth so easily. Kyohei felt something come over him, an all too familiar feeling of lust, and he pushed her back by her shoulders onto the floor where she had been moments ago. He pulled her shorts and panties off, all in one go, and threw them behind him without much care as to where they ended up.

“You came prepared?” Masami frowned her brows at the condom Kyohei pulled out of his pocket. She wasn’t mad, she was happy he had one, but it did confuse her. She didn’t really know he was aware of her trances.

“Always am, Miss Mami~.” Kyohei’s teasing tone, mimicking the voice of her usual muse, made the girl blush, covering her frown with the back of her hand as she laid there, waiting patiently. She looked too cute for what he was about to do to her.

“Shut up and help me.” She grumbled, reminding him why they were here in the first place, and Kyohei couldn’t help but chuckle. The two stayed in their separate states until Kyohei sharply entered her.

Both mind’s turned into a pleasured fog that distracted either side of this couple from the outside world. Not that anything was happening that they would need to look out for, everyone was asleep and Kyohei hade the foresight to close the door. This allowed them, mostly Masami, to moan to their heart’s content. She clutched the top that fluttered over her as Kyohei towered over, holding himself up with one hand and her right thigh with the other.

“K-Kyohei.” She gasped out, eyes half-lidded as she looked up at him as his hand massaged that part of her leg, waiting for her to be comfortable enough for him to move. He seemed pushy, but he did care, being the secretly thoughtful guy he was. The sound of his name told the producer he could start thrusting.

“You’re so tight.” He grunted as those movements pulled him out of the short but sweet trance he found himself in as he watched the young woman writhe beneath him distracted him from the tightness of her. How could a woman said to be so risque and ravaging seem so virginal?

“Y-You’re just big.” The comment made her blush and she pouted, momentarily preoccupied from the heavenly sensation slowly grinding into her.

“Don’t frown like that. I’m sure you’ve dreamt about this, haven’t you?” He drew even closer to her once again, propped on his elbows as he continued to thrust in and out of her, one hand holding her cheek. He was careful not to make it seem like he would try to kiss her.

The smugness of his tone and sudden hard pound of his hips made Masami’s hands fly down his torso to grip the skin of his behind, hoping it would spur him onto giving her more of that much needed pleasure. “K-Kyohei.” Her ideas were finally organising themselves. She was so close. All she needed was a little encouragement.

“Go on. Scream my name. I know you want to.” Even though his own breathing started to hasten, his heart racing and his words sometimes tripping over themselves, Kyohei tried to seem as cool as he usually was. But, the clawing feeling on his lower back and arching of her’s, pressing their bodies even closer together was just so erotic, he found his own thoughts becoming jumbled. There was so much he wanted to say, so many dirty things he wanted to whisper in her ear to make her blush harder, to stutter his name more, he couldn’t understand any of the words that threatened to spill out of his mouth. Something about loving something, but the shriek of the woman below him pulled his thoughts away from that strange sensation.

“K-Kyohei!” Arms flying up his body and around his neck, pulling him closer and her up so he could snake an arm around her, holding their bodies flush together, Masami couldn’t hold back anymore.

“More. Please. I need so much more!” She whimpered in his ear and he only just realised his thrusts had slowed while he was thinking. Then, one thought made sense. Flipping them over so he was on his back and Masami was sitting on his lap, his cock buried so deep inside her she was sure she must have been hollowed out by him, Kyohei smirked.

“Go on, do it yourself. Use me to inspire you.” Sitting, holding each other, his hand clutching the back of her hair so he could whisper in her ear without risk of her pulling back, Kyohei pulled as much out of her as he could. Albeit the ground prohibitted most of his movement. When he loosened his grip, Masami sat up, looking at him with another one of her cutely questioning expressions.

“How do you- Oh!” Masami gasped as he pushed her hips down, mainly to distract her from her question and also to pleasure himself. Her hands once again clenched the fabric on his chest and she subconsciously started bouncing up and down, the sound of skin hitting skin sounding between them. Heavy breathing, moans of each other’s names, and the smell of hot, sweaty sex filled the room. It was lucky they had good ventilation in here.

It didn’t take much longer for either to finish, coincidentally at the same time, and when they both felt each other’s releases, Masami collasped forward, landing on Kyohei’s chest with a soft thud. She was panting, her thighs aching slightly from the exercise, and Kyohei chuckled, his arms sprawled out either side of him. The two finally had a moment of silence...

...Until Masami jumped up, his penis sliding out of her but she didn’t seem to care much, and yanked her journal from the table she had been struggling over before he showed up. As if this hadn’t just happened, as if one of the most sort of bachelors at the moment wasn’t laying half-naked on the floor behind her, Masami started working. She started pouring her heart out onto the pages in front of her, making quick work of the song she had been struggling with for the past day and a half.

It couldn’t be hidden, Kyohei was a little pissed. He had just had one of the most amazing sex sessions he had ever experiences, and she was still able to make it to the desk chair and write? So, he got up, meaning to turn her around and pound her against that journal that seemed to occupy her thoughts, when she met his stern gaze with a delighted smile. He only now saw the slightly darkened rings under her eyes and, despite that, she still looked adorable.

“Thanks, Kyohei, you were a big help!” Masami cheered, slapping her book shut and standing up, only to find the two much closer than she had anticipated. Both their lower halves were completely on show, but she couldn’t let herself look down. She was beat but, most of all, she was able to write. She had been able to accompish what she set out to do.

Kyohei just chuckled at his own stupidity. He should have understood what Mitsu meant when she really did just use his body to satiate her creativity. This was just a trade in professions, a transferable muse and a writer, nothing more, nothing less.

“Call me if you need anymore help.” He winked, his smug smirk returning to his face as Masami blushed at the offer, turning to find her shorts, throwing them on and running out the door so she could finally get some much needed sleep. What neither of them had realised was the pair of panties, tucked behind a filing cabinet after Kyohei had carelessly thrown them over his shoulder.

#scandel in the spotlight #kyohei rikudoh #sits #voltage games #voltage fanfic #voltage smut

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ilovedhim-whydidyouhadtokillhim · 4 years

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I did this... It's an embarrasing number5xreader

Title: That's bullshit in any Language.

(I don't mean to be rude. It's a line Five says to the handler. Ill put un this post part 1 and 2.)

So. This is Five living his life with the Sparrow Academy, and you are an editor that wants to publish his story. It's a few years After you came back to 2019... And it might have some of my ideas on time travel and the comission. Nothing canon or comic canon because i haven't had time to read it yet. Sorry for the grammar.

Chapter 1:

There are plenty of your reasons that I don't understand. Why did you come back? Was it really because of your family or was saving the world that matters? Did you came back just to help them? or because you love them?.-

Those words hit the brain of your interlocutor like a gold lingot adorned with a lemon peel. Effect only achieved by the Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster, which was very far from this part of the universe.

-What do you mean by that?-. He replied annoyed, you were sitting next to a window, in front of you there was a young adult. You were wearing a white blouse and ankle-length skirt. -Well, if you have powers that go beyond reason, and you are capable of leasing with the physical laws that bind everyone else, shouldn't you understand that these are simply events that had to happen in a certain order so that your brothers and everyone else should simply disappear? .-

-What?- He said sissing, with a very pissed off look. You had spent the afternoon listening to his fantastic story. As an assistant to the chef editor at a science fiction publishing house, you thought the young man was trying to sell you his story. Mostly because of the effort he made to make it seem real, he probably wanted to give it a transmedia approach. You thought that perhaps it could work, uploading an internet page, a video game for smartphones and several Facebook pages would sell well too, you saw the future and it was probably easily adapted to the cinema or to a series, you even thought about the fanfiction. If you hadn't detected so many narrative problems… Which on the other hand gave realism to these misfits.

The expression on Five, the pseudonym under which he introduced himself, made it clear that he couldn't believe what he was hearing. But that's how new artists are, they live in their stories, their delirium. And it's understandable. You began talking again. -What Mr. Reginald told Diego, seems to me, it's true for everyone. But at least he's honest about it. In all their actions, these guys are all marked by their father, it’s really their main drive to act.-

You felt a slight guilt, someone so fanatical about their own creation had to put a lot of himself into it, so probably Diego, Klaus, Vanya and all of the others were just a human personification of a hurt part of his adolescence. -Excuse me for telling you this but even with fifty-something years you went to your father for advice. A man who was not older than you in his timeline. Even in the middle of all that conspiracy. You chose to believe in him. -

The young man seemed somewhat nervous, he was sweating a bit and his eyebrows were narrowing in a strange way. -Are you from the association?- he said sweating - Is this a new kind of psychological attack?-. These clarifications gave you a bad feeling, but you decided to joke: -Do you see me with a briefcase?-. It didn't seem to work as you liked. His face showed a terrible aversion and you felt fear. You took your things and left enough money to pay for your coffees, on the table.

-I think it is an excellent work of fiction, Mr. Five. But I think you should solve your problems and calm down a bit before you want to publish it. I don't know what had happened to you to come up with all this but it seems to me that with a good medication and a correct edition you could go far. You are still young and you could even have a great future as an author. But I can't work with someone in your current state.- You took your card out of the bag and gave it to him somewhat shakily. His face changed from rage to disbelief and you left a bit angry and scared.

He scrutinized the white card, it was made with a fancy paper. It had “Dark Horse Books" printed in black. -In my dimension these are "comics" instead of books - he smiled. He hit his head on the table "> your last name <,> your first name <",> phone number <,> office address <.

He realizedrealizado were just a smart girl. -She's probably right. Maybe in all this time I have just lived as a scared child under the table of a man who is not even my father, but the one from Sparrow Academy. After all, even the idiot Luther decided to make his life of his own in this world ...-.

Five called Diego. -Hello brother, another Apocalypse? - Five heard a tone that wanted to be playful but actually sounded concerned. -None, I just want to chat. Are you available for dinner? .-. Five had started college not long ago. Mr. Hargreeves had gotten the adoption papers of Five just as he would have been one of the boys he previously adopted. So everyone was amazed when that young man who looked about 20 "was actually 34".

When you were at home doing office work, you were surprised to know that your appointment for that day had been canceled and that you had stayed all afternoon listening to a poor schizophrenic or drug addict speak.

Chapter 2:

The uneasiness of the meeting with the boy passed and a few weeks later you had time in your schedule for a new interview with the young man who was supposed to arrive on that occasion. You have had coffee and the middle-aged man left.

Nothing out of the ordinary. More stories about zombies and society, it would be edited because it was an acquaintance of the manager. You were beginning to rethink working with that strange young man and his story. You remembered that sometime in your teens you heard about some babies that were born a without their mothers having been pregnant. And a kind of low-profile superhero league that most people took as a hoax to divert attention from things like Watergate, the White House affair among other things.

Probably if the boy was right you were looking at an excellent informant. And it could be an amazingly revealing book ... Especially with all the mythology surrounding JFK. You turned to the window and the young man was watching you from the other block. That again, gave you the chills. You saw him cross the street. It was fortunate that your cup did not have more than the sip you took or you would have spilled it all over yourself.

The young man sat in front of you, the husband of the owner of the cafeteria asked the young man what he wanted. The boy looked stunned. "HAZEL?" The man looked at him for a moment, because that was his ñame but the man was no acquaintance of him. "Excuse me young man, I don't remember meeting you." The boy laughed. -Don't worry, you reminded me of a friend, but it can't be you. It's good to see you anyways.- The man served their coffee somewhat puzzled and walked to talk to his wife, the woman turned her head the table and denied knowing him. Ultimately, neither of them knew who the young man was. This definitely raised several questions but you didn't know which ones. Mostly mportant, what would the young man talk about now?.

You were silent for a while. Five had his hands in his pockets. And you kept looking at the street. You saw how the steam from the coffee made waves above the cup. Again you wear a shirt and skirt. This time a white one with polka dots. Nothing that you could know of but the boy had been a bundle of confusion the last few days. He was not very enthusiast about human company, but he decided to separate from all his previous life experiences and for this he began studying economics. So meeting you at that moment in those clothes made him really dubious about why he was talking to you. Was he really addicted to the apocalypse as you and Diego said?.

Tired of the silence, you asked him a question that seemed uncomfortable for both of you. -The previous time, you only told me your nickname, Mr. Hmmm.- The man looked at you with surprise and smiled at you. -Francis... Reginald, Hargreeves.- you raised your eyebrows. Behind all that delirium, the young man did not look like a Reginald, although on a second thought he dressed like an upper-class young man. He was probably one of those rich young men whose excessive education, gets them a little upset with the world before they should be done with it. -You can call me Frank ... or Five. My siblings, they usually call me Five. So as not to be confused with my father. - The young man seemed somewhat annoyed.

-Oh, it's okay Frank. -, -What do you think of the proposal? . Despite the trust that the young man had placed in you, there was something that prevented you from treating him as a young man of his age. He obviously was not over 23. You didn't know if it was his story, where he is over 60 years old, if it was perhaps his possible mental illness or the aura of presumption that accompanied him.

-Ohhh. I discussed some of that with some of my siblings. They do not agree.- You imagined him sitting at an empty table like the last supper. Except he was just talking to himself. -I see you still don't believe me.-, the young man took out his phone and showed you a picture of him with his family. You could see a huge man, a condecorated policeman, a renowned violinist, an underground model who had worked for several covers with your publishing house, an actress who had just won an Oscar and the little brother. Now that you saw him next to all his family, his story was starting to make a little more sense. Besides, they were all obviously different. Now you thought that the young man could not be more than 21 ... And that it must be difficult to be good by the side of those successful siblings.

The young man seemed to guess your thoughts or maybe it was the pious look you gave him. -Whatever you are thinking, is not the case. I just study for fun. I actually work in a government agency. And believe it or not, for a couple of years I have been in therapy for the post traumatic stress that living so many years alone caused me. Stranded at the end of the world Dolores!-. The young man clapped his mouth quickly, that seemed to hurt. He turned completely red. You didn't know if it was because of the hit or if he had said something embarrassing. While he was telling you his story, his subconscious was quite careful to hide all the details from you about his wife, named Dolores.

And that was. Curiously, the point that he had discussed earlier days with his psychologist, apparently he had not understood (or had not wanted to understand) that the talk he had with you reminded him of his Wife. Only this time, it was really a person outside of himself who answered him with such sharpness and intelligence. And he wasn't going to accept it.

Not knowing all that internal debate, you took another sip of the coffee. "My name is in case you are interested." You said upset. He lowered his hands from his face, it was completely red. -Yes, I know , I just remembered someone while talking to you. - There was no going back after that statement. "Thank you for taking an interest in my story and for listening to a complete stranger say nonsensical things." He now seemed like a completely different person. This boy's range of emotions is a carnival.

-Don't worry, it's part of my job. To tell the truth, I confused you with a young writer and I was quite tough because he is a recommended person to whom we must publish.-. You smiled at him. Apparently the young man liked your comment. -Wow, I must be flattered then.-, -Pretty much actually. We are a very famous publisher present all over the world.-, -And timelines ... it's a joke.-. The young man said when he saw your expression. -For such and such a reason. I look very young. But I think there is something that is not clear to you ... I am also 34. I am not really a young person.- Five had decided to start living according to the age of his brothers. Since he had that opportunity.

You had a pleasant talk, and exchanged phones with the young man. Since the one he had was your work phone number. Probably something good had come out of this confusion. It had gotten quite late, and you had to be on the other side of the city. To finish a part of the work you needed to get up early the next day, a taxi would cost you a lot. The young man saw your concern. -I can take you home, if you want,-. He said with a mischievous smile. You didn't know what he was planning. But you accepted, and walked with him to a parking lot, while you were walking, he asked your address and places near your house, -Oh! I understand, near <>> and that <<< >>>, of course I do know what building you are talking about.- He said while rubbing his chin and doing some imaginary calculations in the air. Being quite far from people, he asked you to take him tightly by the arm. You took it and suddenly you felt something pull you back. You closed your eyes. Next, you were in front of your building.

"What had just happened?" You saw him up, he was a little taller than you and he had a mocking laugh. -I'm sorry that teleportation is not a gift that everyone has. But at least you already tried, right? -. You felt how your intestines took their place again and you got a bit nauseous. You ran to some nearby bushes but you were lucky that you weren't as sick as you thought. You wiped yourself with your sleeve. And you thanked him a bit puzzled. You saw him inquisitively. You had so many questions, but none seemed prudent to be the first. He laughed. He actually seemed like he was quite nice and smart when he wasn't an arrogant know-it-all. If all the things he said to you were true, then he probably did know a lot more than your average citizen.

He accompanied you to your door, said goodbye to you with a kiss on the cheek. He disappeared in front of you with a beam of blue light. Now you had an existential crisis knowing that the world had already ended twice in a past and a future that were actually the past of the present that you lived. And that was nothing at all digestible. After seven years working without missing a single day due to illness, you decided to take a week of unforeseen rest.

I had this posted here too: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26520721/chapters/64640455#workskin

#five hargreeves #tua number five #tua five #five x reader #five fanfiction #the umbrella academy #tua #the hargreeves #aidan gallagher

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tristanlovesthequeen · 3 years

Text

Something Smart

Tristan Arcelona

Claire Daigle

Minding the Canon HTCA-502-01

11/30/16

Artist as Purveyor of the Contemporary Landscape

The first time I saw a representation of Salvador Dali's “The Persistence of Memory” was in a cartoon on Nickelodeon called “Tiny Toons.” I forget the exact scene but somehow this image stayed with me and has pervaded popular culture since its inception. Dali first came up with the idea during a after a dinner party with his wife, Gala and some artist friends. After dinner the group decided to go to the cinema and Dali decided to hang back. He sat at the head of the table observing a loaf of Camembert cheese and pondering the super soft texture of it. He sat down and began to work at the painting. It was almost complete upon the return of his wife. Upon seeing it she proclaimed that it was a sight impossible to be unseen.

The simplicity of the initial concept of soft cheese was then taken to the next step through Dali's hyper paranoiac conceptualism and then taken even further by art critics, theorists, and historians who believed it had to do with Einstein's theory of relativity. Later on in Dali's career he began to paint about this topic, with the advent of nuclear physics and string theory, molecular structures and DNA mapping. This is an instance of artist creating a brand, and the symbiotic relationship between the supply chain and the demand creating new technologies, hybridized paintings, and advancement in concept. Dali drifted between faith systems his entire life, finding sources of inspiration and exploring them, sharing his findings and experiments through the medium of art. What started as landscape and portraiture evolved into impressionism then cubism and then his most famous surrealist stage. This period explored the concept of dream reality and meaning of dream symbols which directly connected him to the theories of Sigmund Freud. When criticized by fellow surrealists as purely a commercial painter, he denounced surrealism, needing only his wife Gala. He lived a life in the spotlight through wars, moving from Europe to New York and back again. He progressed the ideas explored in surrealism to scientific theorems and in the tail end of his career he became more of a faith based painter.

Sometimes the mythology of a painting's creation is more interesting than the painting itself. It's reputation precedes it and therefore it achieves high levels of fame. One such painting is “Dance at the Moulin de la Galette” by Renoir. The Moulin de la Galette was a popular dance hall/ bar/ restaurant for the impressionists to meet in Montmarte Paris, France during the late 1800's. Pierre Auguste Renoir had a studio nearby. Legend has it that everyday he would carry the canvas with a friend down to the Moulin de la Galette and set up his easel.

Renoir leased a studio at 12 Rue Cortot, in April 1875. It came furnished and had two floors, where he lived with his brother. He made several studies at the Moulin de la Galette. Renoir's civil servant friend Georges Riviere writes how friends helped carry the canvas back and forth “We would carry this canvas every day from the rue cortot to the moulin, because the painting was executed entirely on the spot. This was not without difficulties, when the wind blew and the big canvas threatened to fly away like a kite over the Butte.” (pg. 64)

Renoir used his friends and acquaintances from all walks of life as models. He had a favorite female sitter, whose name was Jeanne and was sixteen who refused the main role in the painting but appears later in life as the main character in “The Swing.” Instead, her sister Estelle models the pink and blue ribbon dress.

Renoir went through a period in his life where he and his fellow impressionist compatriots were penniless. Renoir combated this period in his life by writing letters to friends asking for money, also by staying with fellow artists such as Monet. It seemed the impressionist vision was fading with the salon show actually losing money and his artist group parting ways. His main gallerist Durand-ruel closed his London location and it seemed that all was lost. Famished, Renoir started painting portraits and with a stroke of luck and genius, he was able to make the acquaintance of one of Duret's friends Deudon, who was a wealthy lawyer and owner of a clothing store Old England. Duedon comissioned him to paint a mural in his estate, a portrait of Madame Duedon and five of his finished pieces.

This granted Renoir passage to build upon what he had been pursuing with his portrait studies to create the symphony of motion and light that we know as Bal du Moulin de la Galette. After exhibiting, he was able to land several published reviews as was the style at the time. However, instead of advancing his process and concept, the reviews were mostly negative, 2/6 were favorable.

Most of Renoir's paintings are figurative, all signifying spacial pictoral depth. Some are landscape. Now they seem highly unoriginal, the best part about them being the color and motion of brushstroke. His model choice changed slightly over the years, yet remained mostly young white women, beginning with light red hair and progressing to black. He undeniably had a type, at his worst remained a blank, doll-like expression. Even in the Bal du Moulin de la Galette, his most populated painting, it looks as though the main female model repeats over and over as though she were dancing with her clones. However, he combats this with the dappled shadows from the overhanging branches, the representation of the contemporary styles of the time, and the bright and sunny disposition of all the participants of the scene. One cannot help but feel nostalgic for a period that would not have existed if the Impressionists had not imagined and created it.

Advance time about a hundred years or more and we find Bruce la Bruce's movie Super 8 1/2. This movie is a mockumentary based on a queer fetishistic porn producer's life and work. Things have changed since the 90's, with the advancement of the internet interrupting basically every aspect of our lives. Porn is everywhere. This movie is reminiscent of John Waters' tongue in cheek reality. The stars are not perfect right wing citizens, they are “underground” and rife with problems, and we see how very real they are. The main character takes after Andy Warhol, he has taken to alcoholism and lives in a dingy room with aluminum colored space blankets on the walls. He is always in a state of heartbreak and his relationships with his costars are argumentative and violent.

Googie is an adventurous porn producer who finds her subjects in mysterious ways. She finds a lesbian couple hooking up in a graveyard and casts them as her new stars. A confessional interview shows them talking about their threesomes with strangers and hatred for hetero cis men. They like to “fuck them, and fuck with their minds.” Wednesday and Friday describe going into clubs with a pair of scissors and cutting off straight men's ponytails. They aren't serious strippers, they are quirky and take their sexuality and dancing with a slight humorous bend.

The stars are full of themselves and obsessed with fame. Their egos cause them to blow up in violent outbursts at each other and exploit each other. The difference between Bruce la Bruce's porn and every other run of the mill porn filmed in New York or the valley, is that these stars have been given credit for being avant garde art stars. One such plot is Bruce driving an old Jaguar down a a desolate country road and hitting a hitchhiker. He gets out of the car to check on the man who he has hit and ends up getting a blowjob when he regains consciousness. The movie concludes with the stranger throwing up on the side of the road and Bruce hopping back in the car and driving away.

A movie directed by Googie and starring Wednesday and Friday, the two lesbian “sisters,” pictures them holding a man up with a WWII army beretta, lubing up his rear and shoving the covered pistol in his behind. They finish him off by stripping him bare in the brush, powdering him and equipping him with a diaper.

The movie is a black comedy. Visually it is devoid of colour. Needless to say, it is weighty in its stark portrayal of a scene that is hardly ever represented in the main stream without being over glorified. It is an industry, much like the meat industry, that remains invisible in its process, yet is pervasive throughout history, since the dawn of photography. It has it's parallels in the art scene, with painters and photographers alike representing models who may or may not have participated in porn shoots. The credit goes to the artist usually, with the model being a conduit to his concept, and it is impossible to see how much the subject actually contributed to the process and final image.

Eventually we see Bruce's participation in the industry drowning him in sorrow. He stumbles around the courtyard of an insane asylum in black doc martens, white pants, and a white straight jacket. He has been exploited to no end, what was supposed to save his career, the interviews and collaborations, actually detrimented from it. His friend describes him as losing touch with reality, blurring the line between his movies and his waking life. We see him shellshocked on camera dropping a line of infinite wisdom and rebuking it, attempting to cover his tracks, rephrasing it as if it can be edited out of the space time continuum.

The film is filmed in low-fi black and white with almost no budget. Needless to say, it is an art film. It documents a sub culture that concerns itself with a subversive beauty, that the mainstream is dangerous. It takes hard work no matter what you do, whoever said being a pornstar is easy? We see the image of a young black man on a benchpress, the director condemning him for not being able to get it up, that he has had “Three fluffers already.” That the price of fame might be the price of your mental well being, that the more one departs from mainstream society the more danger one welcomes into their personality. That somehow being beautiful and volatile gives you control over others, it creates a desire in them to do your will. However, it is only tolerable for a short period of time. Misery loves company but it also attracts a certain type of self aware genius. We are only comfortable with our avarice in the midst of a reflection, and when that reflection starts to change we are disgusted and need to move on. We accept that life is hard and must accept the most gruesome of challenges because our ability to tolerate and moderate these events bring us a sense of personal satisfaction, the sense of grit to survive. The fear always lies with our insecurities. When will this life bring me under? How much is too much? In this industry, pain and substance abuse go hand in hand. In theory, the dampening of the limbic system allows us to surpass the constant onslaught of painful memories. What is actually happening is quite the opposite. How one chooses to combat these issues or feelings depends on a personality type or a type of abuse someone has endured in the past, whether it was mental, physical or sexual. Occasionally people attempt to welcome back this type of abuse into their lives, they put themselves in situations that repeat or glorify an abusive situation and it becomes a cycle without rebirth leading to their ultimate destruction and downfall. Given the right willpower, resources, and technique one can break this cycle. Life is not without pitfalls and setbacks, but only if we take them that way. This can lead us further into space or further equip us to deal with life has to offer us.

Ultimately society was not built to do us any favors. The kind of free sexual rebellion that this movie introduces is somewhat refreshing somewhat stale. It shows us that this behavior might not land us in prison, but might lead us to a sort of mental exile where we feel alien to the world. The world has offered us an escape from mainstream only to find that we are caught in another mainstream. Crimes against humanity are rampant wherever we go and it is not until we accept them as part of our culture that we find any release.

Tony smith created the steel sculpture “Die” in 1968 with the intention of representing the “square root” of six. It is literally six by six feet, metaphorically representing death by being six feet deep and a six foot box. It is brooding in its intentionality, also seems to be a means to an end goal of traveling to New York. The NGA describes the piece as “embracing the heroic and humanistic attitudes associated with abstract expressionist art of the 1950's,” however I would describe the movement as one filled mostly with a sense of white male machismo. How could he have not noticed the gigantic black cube in the middle of Jerusalem called the Kaaba which houses the holy book of the Q'uuraan? Millions of people flock to the religious site each year to pay homage to the prophet Muhammad. Arguably, this is an even larger homage to organized religion and the prowess of another man of a separate ethnicity. Both cubes are homages to death, one is immensely popular and other remains a mirror of a small dying culture, we shall presume the reader knows which one is which.

Sometimes art is less conceptual as a metaphor for what is already present in life, and turns into a science project that invigorates the future of materiality, which is what all visual art media is based. Traditional materials are often decided by trends in the economy, sudden turns of fate determine which path is chosen and which materials will become the new norm. What replaced the steam engine with the gasoline powered motorcar and what replaced paper made from trees instead of hemp, was usually a rich investor that decided it was easier to pollute than to create something that is sustainable and equally as useful. What we have now is a bunch of overworked, underpaid employees that are just as polluted in their minds as the environments lakes and rivers.

Iris van Herpen is a designer that falls into a new genre of material futures. Material futures deals with finding a category of unsustainable or overused materiality, whether it be, organs, meat that we eat, or clothes that we wear. She creates new fabrics that are produced using 3d scans and furthermore printed and stitched by hand and machine to create designs reminiscent of HR Giger meets fairy princess, Hufflepuff meets Slitheryn in Harry Potter fan lore. She is conducting science with the touch of a skilled wizard, producing new leather from cow cells and lightweight fabrics lighter than silk. This technology continues to progress around the world. Her theory is not that we should be creating new wearable technologies that are stylistically unsound, meant to connect us to the outside world without bringing anything new to the physical realm. Her textures and textiles connote that we can represent how we feel and what we have experienced through a suit that we wear. 3D printing is becoming more accessible, to the point that people could do it “if they could only find the time.” If Iris van Herpen ever becomes mainstream we might not find the time to leave the house in the morning, staring at our reflections, robing and disrobing again until we can find the right form to describe our ever changing mood.

As it so happens, Iris van Herpen interned for Alexander McQueen, a famous English fashion designer who has died but his name still rings on. Before his death in 2010, he put together a show called VOSS, in which models were to reenact the mentality of being in an inpatient unit. Models shaped like gazelles stumble around in high heels looking posh and sleek with some sort of headdress that looks as though they have strapped pantyhose to their heads. Kate moss fumbles at the walls, which, are double sided mirrors, the audience can see in but none of the models on the runway can see out. The models, while nice to look at, sporting some amazing designs by McQueen, are perhaps not the most interesting part of the show. The climax comes, as the large rectangular rhombus in the center of the room comes crashing open, glass shatter and butterflies spread everywhere, fluttering about in the light. The main character, unclear whether she is the protagonist/ antagonist, reclines nude inside the cube, sporting a gas mask with concord wings a precursor to a character in Mad Max Fury Road.

It just so happens that this model is Michelle Olley, a London based writer and magazine editor who specializes in culture. She was a key figure in queer and fetish culture in the 80's and 90's and has since hopped around from job to job and now works as content manager for Turner Broadcasting's Adult Swim. On her blog, she describes the experience of being involved in the project. The all around stress she was under and the real life torture she felt being kept in the box.

“If it weren’t for yoga I’d be in absolute agony by now. I can’t move much because moving breaks wings; my lower leg is dead after about twenty minutes on the chair. I’ve got at least an hour and a half alone in here, and that’s if the show starts on time, which of course they never, ever do. After about another fifteen minutes my right shoulder, which is leaning on a cushion, starts to ache. I’m clutching onto Stephen’s best scalpel—which I need to slash open the butterfly net that contains 250 live moths and butterflies. I’m holding the net in my other hand trying to keep it still so I don’t disturb them. The radio earpieces are throbbing—they’ve been hurting since they wrapped the bandages round them. It’s not too bad in the mask. I can breathe OK. The temperature is awful, though. They need to keep it cold in there so that the moths will remain still/placid. Cold air is being piped in, as when the lights go on at showtime, it’s going to get really hot. The cold air is giving me goose bumps and making the glue/moth parts all around my body really itchy. My head’s hot, my body’s freezing. Time to test whether they really are listening at all times. I ask Anna to turn off the air con and they agree to give it a rest for ten minutes. I have no idea how long it took to shut it off or low long it was off for, but it wasn’t enough. Before I know it, the pipes are blowing again—sending another flurry of broken wings and antennas off me and I’m shivering. Anna tells me they’re running about twenty minutes late (it was about an hour to the official start by this point). By this stage I have no idea how long I’ve been in there, or how long I have left. Time has ceased to be quantifiable. I’m too focused on not thinking about my discomfort, not getting emotional, saying warm and not thinking about the fact I was busting for a pee. I just wanted desperately to get it over with. Sometime later Anna calls to say it would be another fifteen minutes on top of the twenty (“We’re waiting for Gwyneth, who’s stuck in traffic”). Bring. It. On. Before getting in the box, I’d seen all the names on the chairs through the two-way mirrored glass. Paltrow was at my feet, next to Nick and Charlotte Knight; my backside was right to Isabella Blow, Grace Jones, Sharlene from Texas and Ronnie and Jo Wood. Could they tell I was hatching a radio mic? I’d also spotted Tracy Chapman, Tracey Emin and Jake Chapman’s names on the chairs. My early comment about “doing it for art” was coming true in an unexpected fashion...

No, it’s the art thing again. I want people to know what I just went through wasn’t a breeze and I did it for art. Yes, art. Because I believe it’s worth going through that much palaver if it creates a strong image that conveys an important idea. And I believe that the idea that we are trapped by our “civilized,” socially approved identities is massively important. It causes women so much suffering. Fear of aging, fear of not being thin enough. Fear of not having the right clothes. Fear of our animal natures that we carry in our DNA—fish, bird, lizard, insect, mammal. We’ve never had it more techno, we’ve never needed it more human. We humans living now still cannot turn ourselves into perfect beings, no matter how long we spend at the gym, beauty parlour, shops, etc.”

Sometimes it takes a whole orchestra of behind the scenes folks to get a project realized. Sometimes it is only a handful of people who receive the credit for a massive undertaking such as this. Why is Tracy Chapman still relevant? Because she is involved with the culture. And when all is said and done, however equally distributed the pain and strife of the work that was completed, we still live in a world where Benjamin Franklin is accredited with the discovery of electricity. Perhaps McQueen would have not felt so weighed down by the responsibility of stardom if the attention received for such a project was distributed with more equity. Michelle Olley still learned a valuable lesson in body image from the experience of participating in the project, so it seems that process can be the most important part of creation.

Haruki Murakami writes in his novel Kafka on the Shore, “That’s why I like to listen to Schubert while I’m driving. Like I said, it’s because all the performances are imperfect. A dense, artistic kind of imperfection stimulates your consciousness, keeps you alert. If I listen to some utterly perfect performance of an utterly perfect piece while I’m driving, I might want to close my eyes and die right then and there. But listening to the D major, I can feel the limits of what humans are capable of—that a certain type of perfection can only be realized through a limitless accumulation of the imperfect. And personally, I find that encouraging.”

Contemporary art seems to operate solely upon this concept, that there are continuous builds based upon the notion that everything here is imperfect. Competition is based on this nodule that human kind has something to prove, that there is somehow something better to be strived for. Competition within contemporary art pushes boundaries of what is conceptual, accepted, what element of art history the piece is derived from, and what new materials can be used. Since there is no purpose in striving for perfection, it eliminates the competition within the art world. What is left is abstract free flowing ideas. Competition in the art world, it seems only exists within the art market. Survival of the fittest is based on who has the latest advancement in technology “who has the biggest guns” and who can obtain the largest chunk of the economy. Eventually people try to compensate by dumping the largest amount of money into a particular project, here size of the object, materiality, location, and finish come into play. What is left can be impactful, just because of the immense capabilities of one particular artist.

The Japanese synth composer Yuzo Koshiro, who is famous for his video game scores during the 90's describes this concept when being called the king of FM synthesis. “It’s an honour for me. Though there are a lot of people who use the FM synth well. As I said before, in terms of game music... Trying to use an FM synth with MIDI had so many restrictions. I don’t think people could use the chip to its full potential exactly as they wanted. Since I made my own editor and driver, I could control everything about the chip down to the fine details. So I think that’s why I was able produce that level of sound. I definitely don’t think I’m great at making quality tones though. Being able to control every little thing freely was one of the main reasons I received that kind of praise.” Koshiro was able to fine tune his process by using his own tools, which he developed, using his own ideal of how he saw the future. Still, he believes the final product was not the embodiment of perfection. He finds that the more one plays through a video game with the music that he has composed, the more the melodies grow on us.

“Is it the quiet shore of contemplation that I set aside for myself, as I lay bare, under the cunning, orderly surface of civilizations, the nurturing horror that they attend to pushing aside by purifying, systematizing, and thinking; the horror that they seize on in order to build themselves up and function? I rather conceive it as a work of disappointment, of frustration and hollowing—probably the only counterweight to abjection. While everything else –its archaeology and its exhaustion—is only literature: The sublime point at which the abject collapses in a burst of beauty that overwhelms us—and that cancels our existence” Kristeva.

Kristeva's “Powers of Horror” is a long, drawn out study on the abject. How she was able to complete such a tour de force is beyond us, which is probably why it seems so intelligent. She was able to sustain concentration on the most unbearable subjects, and most art students, given the the task of completing the entire transcript, are unable to do so. If there is one positive concept to be derived from this reading, it is that the abject is necessary in small doses, in order to achieve the opposite. What disrupts and disgusts us can make us believe that there is an opposite. That notion is described in the quote as the sublime.

If we look at the hollowness of space as terrifying, then we see why people decide to huddle together within city walls. We condense only to realize that this too, can be perceived as abject, and in the instance, we decide to disperse. In this way, the feeling of abjection can flip flop, all at once describing the fickle nature of the human personality, and the lightness of being alive.

“Women artists are more inward-looking, more delicate and nuanced in their treatment of their medium, it may be asserted. But which of the women artists cited above is more inward-turning then Redon, more subtle and nuanced in the handling of pigment than Corot? Is Fragonard more or less feminine than Mme. Vigee-Lebrun? Or is it not more a question of the whole Rococo style of eighteenth-century France being "feminine," if judged in terms of a binary scale of "masculinity" versus "femininity"? Certainly, if daintiness, delicacy, and preciousness are to be counted as earmarks of a feminine style, there is nothing fragile about Rosa Bonheur's Horse Fair, nor dainty and introverted about Helen Frankenthaler's giant canvases. If women have turned to scenes of domestic life, or of children. so did Jan Steen, Chardin, and the Impressionists-- Renoir and Monet as well as Morisot and Cassatt. In any case, the mere choice of a certain realm of subject matter, or the restriction to certain subjects, is not to be equated with a style, much less with some sort of quintessentially feminine style.”

Traditionally, throughout history, most of the credit of winning has been given to men. Credit is sometimes equated to fame, such as Alexander McQueen's stylistic designs and art shows, where there are numerous participants. However, what equates fame? How do we quantify how well known something is? If something that lives in our hearts is more important than fame, how is it that we measure? Many ideas presented in the art history canon have been proposed by women first. We see this in the example of Carolee Schneemann's “Meat Joy” and also “Up to and Including Her Limits.” Matthew Barney used the same ideas in his piece “Drawing Restraint” several years later and arguably received more credit. He is also referencing his “personal mythology,” which might include pieces that Schneemann has produced. Meat Joy creates a scene where the body is abjectly presented as a vessel of meat, flesh we consume is also the flesh we destroy, and the theme of abject flesh is now popularized in contemporaries like Jenny Saville. Where once upon a time it was popular to idealize the human form, it is now popular to debunk the myth of a perfect form and present the new ideal as a medley of body types and human characteristics, not ignoring the ever presence of the abundance of flesh, and bodily fluids. In terms of art, the gender of the object is attributed to whomever created it, no matter how rugged or polished the piece may be. The independence of women artists does not suggest that they did not particularly belong to a certain school or class of artists, it just means that they were not recognized for being there. Since the presence of art history is also based upon the presence of critics and historians, the relationships between these individuals and the people they chose to represent is important too. The interpersonal relationships amongst individuals in the art world also influence who receives a review. Ana Mendietta is mostly recognized for her relationship with Carl Andre, as Lucian Freud is mostly recognized because he is grandson to Sigmund Freud. Not to say either is necessarily without talent, which is quite the opposite, however people are recognized mostly from their upbringing and what circles they revolve in.

Which leaves me believing something is missing within the art world and the world at large. We all experience the sense of the void, which is a mirror of the total amount of dark matter in the universe. There is something amiss, and we are not quite sure what it is. The Fifth Element addresses this concept, with the notion that there is a missing element that will save the universe. With designs by Jean Giraud Moebius and Jean Paul Gaultier, this french cult classic is one of the most visually stunning movies to date.

The plot revolves around the main character Korben Dallas and his relationship with the embodiment of the fifth element, Leeloo. She is a fanboy's dream, a young model actress that does not speak English, is the visage of perfection but does not have any visual or cultural preference of her own to speak of, nor any knowledge of who she is or what humans are. Besides this general monotony, she contains an element that is activated by a particular piece of knowledge. What Korben Dallas teaches her, is the concept of love. This is the final unifying element in the universe, the one that clarifies the dream, and brings light to an otherwise dark place. No matter what your belief system is, if you are a human, animal, sentient being, this rings true. What is the essence of life, what is the point of materiality if there is no feeling there?

With my own work, I feel a sense of displacement usually rather than belonging. A jumble of ideas are mashed together usually to bring a solution to some sort of negativity, in order to see the light shine through. Many artists use their art as a way to connect on a broader spectrum, in this way I am no different. I find that personally I connect best at a small scale, one or two people rather than a huge group. Limiting options of who to talk to can create a stronger bond, as if limiting one's palate, in order to know what is truly motivating one's soul.

With what I create, I tend to maximize my reference points. I create a mashup of things I have experienced, usually told in the form of a fable created through symbolism of images derived from 90's pop culture. Perhaps this is me bringing to the forefront the notion of keeping my childhood alive, by subliming memories of contemporary life. Art can be about breaking free of limits, so my process constantly changes to remove myself from an XY axis and a grid, to constantly build and destroy, to remove anger, hate, and turn it into love.

This semester I have learned a few things about the art world and art school in specific. There are a few key tropes that reoccur and navigating them is mostly about the language used to describe them. For example, using the word umwelt for someone's personal bubble; using the term post humanism when someone really means Sci-fi; structuralism for patterns that repeat; anthropocene for the current affect of global warming. Part of the interchangeability of words to describe these things has to do with the malleability of the ideas themselves. As we saw with Salvador Dali's study of string theory, different personal views conjure up different worlds. The study of these worlds leads us on our own personal journeys. We envelop these concepts and let the future unfold, perhaps we use art as the mechanism to advance human kind. I always thought of art as some kind of pseudo-science, now I can say that these things are interchangeable, art can be science, theory, personal reflection, fortune telling, and the economy. The mythology that leads us here today can change time.

Works Cited

Barbara Ehrlich White, Renoir His Life Art and Letters. 1984. Harry N. Abrams, Inc. New York

NGA.gov for tony smith's die

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/08/t-magazine/iris-van-herpen-designer-interview.html?_r=0

http://blog.metmuseum.org/alexandermcqueen/michelle-olley-voss-diary/

http://daily.redbullmusicacademy.com/2014/09/yuzo-koshiro-interview

The fifth element

#Tristan Chase Arcelona

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