Archives for category: Sublimity

Watching a digital native bloom

September 5, 10 //

Long ago, during the very brief period (about a year) during which I was a desperate housewife, I took a Photoshop class. Since then, it’s been my favorite toy; when I’m bored, I fire it up and try to make art. My best work is rather… personal… so I won’t share. It would be indecorous. (I did have it on an anonymous erotica blog for a while, but I took the blog down because it was associated with one of my gmail addresses and I was afraid one day they’d announce to all my professional contacts through some new “service” that it was mine.)

I have a 12-year-old niece who just discovered Photoshop a couple of months ago, when she was still 11. This niece also happens to have a huge crush on her geeky, artistic, Apple fan (not quite fanboy) uncle Vincent. Nothing odd about that; I had uncle crushes too. One turned out to be schizophrenic and the other would feel right at home at a Tea Party… Oh well. But the schizo one looked like Marlon Brando and Paul Newman combined, and the other one had a fabulous nose (always had a thing for noses) and was much less uptight back in the 70s, when he drank a lot of beer.

Anyway. So as soon as my little niece got the hang of Photoshop, which appears to have taken something like two days, she started sending her uncle gifts. These are some of my favorites:

Now, let me add that my niece’s parents are both stage actors, and her dad’s a playwright too. Her mom is a total technophobe. Her dad is not, but he’s no geek. He just got an iPhone the other day, and my niece e-mailed her uncle Vincent to commiserate with him because she’d spent the entire day showing her dad how to use it (she is a wiz with her iPod touch).

Until now, this is the kind of art project my niece has traditionally done (probably since birth) with her outdoorsy, Earth Mother mother:

They do a lot of this kind of stuff. (She’s one of those mothers who always make you feel inadequate because you don’t spend all your free time with your kids making dolls out of flowers and gingerbread houses and shit.) But there’s something to be said for that kind of dedication. It undoubtedly contributed to my niece’s creativity and aesthetic sensibility.

Not only is she a budding geekette, but she’s also a budding Apple fangirl:

Now, this work is truly impressive, but what inspired it is even more interesting.

Her uncle’s Apple love and her desire to please him certainly come into play. But more than that, it’s the products themselves.

They’re purty. Delicate. Sleek. Shiny. (These images say a lot about how this little girl perceives the products.) There’s a refinement to Apple products that jumps the gender gap (and creates a healthy aftermarket for butch iPhone cases for those who aren’t real comfy with their feminine side, or “How to make your Apple product look more like a Hummer”).

Getting the girls on board is no small feat for tech companies (laptop bag manufacturers haven’t figured it out yet). What GameBoy would have given to have girls go for GameGirls the way they have for Apple stuff!

In couples, women make most of the purchasing decisions. And for a long time now, single girls have been buying their own diamonds, if you get my drift. Apple, with its aesthetically delectible toys, has managed to achieve the Woman Acceptance Factor, starting very young, without alienating the boys.

Maybe the reason they haven’t come out with the red (or maybe pink, depending on my mood) iPhone I want yet is because they don’t want to scare the boys away… Or maybe it’s just a classiness thing. I guess wanting a pink iPhone makes me less classy, but I’m OK with that.

In past generations, we’d look at kids and think “they’re the future,” and buy them hula hoops to keep them occupied till they grew up and became a factor. But this generation is decidedly the present as well as the future. So watch closely. It’s fascinating.

In any case, Steve, I think you should look at my niece’s work. It might give you some ideas for your next ad campaign. Just e-mail me and I’ll tell you where to send the check.

Dogs don’t hibernate

February 10, 10 //

You have to walk them, even in the winter. At least it’s winter in Paris…

(Click for bigger. See the gulls on the quay?)

Once a muse, always a muse(d)

November 23, 09 //

Now Vincent has yet another thing to blame me for. First it was the Geeks In Love, his online comic strip chronicling the daily lives of a pair of geeks. You see, he says I’m his muse, which is why it’s all my fault.

To my knowledge, I had never been a muse before I met Vincent. Sure, I’ve had guys recite things to me like “Age cannot wither her, nor custom stale / Her infinite variety: other women cloy / The appetites they feed: but she makes hungry / Where most she satisfies…”* That was nice. Very nice, even. But they were just quoting other people’s words inspired by other muses.

It’s rather scary to be a muse sometimes; a big responsibility. I feel pressure to keep the inspiration flowing. But evidently I’m doing something right, because for the last three plus months, Vincent spent big chunks of his spare time at his computer in a creative bubble; oblivious, impervious, uncommunicative. If I pouted that he wasn’t paying enough attention to me, or suggested he occasionally take out the trash too, he would grumble “This is your fault.” I guess that’s one of the hazards of muse work.

So what was he doing for three months, you ask? The answer is a beautiful, colorful, exciting, fun, sophisticated new site dedicated exclusively to his music. I must say I do excellent work (he’s not bad either).

Until now, his music has been scattered all over the Web and it was nearly impossible to get a sense of just how prolific and versatile a composer/musician Vincent really is. So I bitched (as per the muse job description) and said he wasn’t giving his music the respect it deserved.

As they say, “good work is rewarded with more work” so, because I’m such a superior muse, as soon as the music site was done, Vincent went into another (short-term) bubble making his first ever music video for his song Round and Round (NSFW version). Here it is, for your listening and viewing pleasure.

Not only am I the official Vincent Knobil muse, I am also the official biographer (see the “About” links on the Geeks site and the music site), and camerawoman for his soon-to-be-famous (or -banned) video.

If you appreciate my work, do become a fan of Vincent’s music on Facebook!

*Shakespeare, Antony and Cleopatra

November number four

November 20, 09 //

It’s November again, and that means it’s time for me to indulge in the tradition that has apparently replaced Thanksgiving: my annual November photo, to celebrate the most beautiful month of the year (in Paris, at least).

I took this year’s pic with the iPhone I inherited from Vincent when he got the fancy new one. This explains the mellow look of the picture compared to those of previous years. It was a tiny bit hazy that morning. Kinda dreamy, don’t you think? I didn’t add any effects; that would be cheating.

My son was supposed to be in Paris for 10 days this month, but he cancelled on me. That’s what you do when you’re 24. It’s really too bad. This is my fourth November here, and it’s the warmest yet. It’s been in the 50s for most of the month so far, with plenty of those bright, crisp November days I love so much.

Click the pic for a larger version.

Previous years’ November photos:

2008 | 2007 | 2006

How green is my Wiley

November 17, 09 //

Audible sigh.

When Vincent and I were discussing* getting a dog, we hit a major culture bump. Evidently dog owners here in France are overwhelmingly members of the conservative and well-to-do bourgeoisie, something that an ascetic bohemian political lefty like Vincent finds abhorrent. As I understand it, if you have a dog here, you’re basically perceived as flipping off everybody who’s not rich.

I had to explain to him that dog ownership didn’t have that kind of baggage where I come from, that it’s as American as apple pie, Norman Rockwell, and so on. I can’t help it, I’m the product of my culture. I never cried harder than when I finished Where the Red Fern Grows. I found out at one point (completely by accident) that 44% of Americans own dogs. See Vincent? It’s normal!

Now how did I miss that red flag? I should have listened to myself! Since when do I point to America as a model of proper behavior? I was not being logical. I was carried away by my save-the-little-doggy crusade. One of these days, like many other American habits, the pet habit is going to have to go…

But the deed is done. Wiley is alive and eating 150 grams of kibble a day (I have no idea what that is in dollars). I throw several plastic bags of poo in the trash every day. Wiley is destroying the planet and he doesn’t even know it, poor thing.

In this New Scientist article, you can read all about Fido’s carbon footprint and weep. It’s a good article; eye opening. I question some of the stats, however. My assumption has always been that pet food is mostly made of by-products of the meat produced for humans, which means there’s overlap. So if 50% of a cow goes to you and 50% goes to Fido, you can’t count that cow’s carbon footprint twice… At least not till it branches off into pet food production. Anyway, when humans get a clue, or – much more likely – are forced by global food shortages to stop eating meat and grow soybeans, I imagine the pet problem will take care of itself, like all the rest. (Added November 22: The article linked to above is bullshit. Thanks David Horton!! Wiley loves you! Me too. I immediately gave him a treat and told him it was from Uncle David.)

But since I don’t own a car, clothes dryer, dishwasher, or even a garbage disposal… Since I haven’t eaten red meat in nearly 28 years, I’ll let Wiley walk in my footprint for the short time he’s here. And at least he’s a shelter mutt and I didn’t contribute to the purebred dog racket.

But Wiley will be my last dog.

Then I’ll have to feed my fix by adding to my collection of vintage ceramic poodle tchotchkes (Wouldn’t that be a great name for a poodle?). I already have a planter, a pepper shaker, a knife rest, and an egg cup, all from the 40s and 50s. I bought the first one 23 years ago and the last one two weeks ago (I’m picky). And maybe I’ll put up vintage posters to remind me of the good old days, when I was a girl and girls could be girls and they could have dogs.

Wiley has a Twitter account. If your dogs (or cats; Wiley’s open minded) are the Internet types, send them over to join the conversation: ducks, peacocks, spaghetti, duels… He has two dog friends at this point, Lily (a Westie) and Dooley (a Corgi mutt). He also follows a famous cat who has not deigned to follow him back.

Yes, I know it’s absurd. But so is everything.

*P: I want a dog.
V: I don’t want a dog.
P: I want a dog.
V: I don’t want a dog.
P: I want a dog.
V: I don’t want a dog.
P: I want a dog.
V: I don’t want a dog.
…

Artlessness

October 31, 09 //

My mother used to paint, but she hasn’t picked up a brush in over 30 years [because of a dark plot twist]. And she was good. When I was off living my own life in my early 20s, she was getting ready to move. She’d already shipped her paintings across an ocean, but then she didn’t end up moving [because of another dark plot twist], and she didn’t bother to get them back. They’re gone forever. My brother and I are eternally bummed about that.

Anyway, she was working towards a Fine Arts degree when I was a kid, on and off, and I know a tiny (tiny) bit about art because I used to read her textbooks for fun, and she’d give me little art history lessons every now and then. Of course, in my first semester of college, I took the requisite Survey of Art History, which was essentially a three-month slideshow in an amphitheater, but that was two million years ago, so it’s pretty much gone.

When I met Vincent, who owns (and actually reads) books with titles like Art and Politics in the Weimar Period, suddenly the fact that I could (usually) tell a Monet from a Manet seemed rather severely lame. But fortunately I live in France now, where art oozes out from between the cracks in the cobblestones and creeps like fungus up the walls. It gets under your skin and you eventually start to respond to art, even if your artistic sensibilities were grossly underdeveloped to begin with. At least that’s what’s happening to me. Living with an artist helps, of course. I now get art history lessons from him. Got one last night, in fact, on Dada.

French TV spews art too. They even talk about the arts on the evening news, at the end, where in the States we get baseball… There’s a fabulous show we often watch called Metropolis on Arte, a French-German arts channel. On Metropolis a couple of weeks ago, I discovered my new favorite artist, a previously underrated (apparently) Russian avant-garde (apparently) painter (and costume designer, set designer, illustrator, and writer) named Natalia Goncharova (also Gontscharowa).

Vincent thinks the fact that humans can make art is the only thing that makes them worth the space they take up. I say our only redeeming quality is our capacity for loving. This minor difference of opinion does not cause a lot of conflict in our relationship.

Here’s some Natalia for your viewing pleasure:

Self-portrait, 1907

The Cyclist, 1913

Composition with trees, 1920s

Ballet program, or poster?

Let’s be sensible

October 10, 09 //

In French, sensible means “sensitive.” It’s a false friend, or faux ami, as we francophiles like to say. (However, in the English phrase “Don’t be so sensitive!” the correct French word is susceptible. False friend again. I could go on and on because I love this stuff, but this post is not a French lesson.)

It may be a French culture lesson, though. You see, I got married to a Frenchman today.

It was the sensible thing to do. I’ve been living here in limbo, with visiteur prominently displayed on the ID they issued me. Every year I have to renew it by sending in a pile of paperwork, and then I wait to get approved for another year.

As a lowly visiteur, I was entitled to the nationalized health coverage, which is one of many things that prove to me what a civilized country this is. The coverage includes incredibly cheap prescription meds too. (I pay two Euros for a tiny bottle of eyedrops that cost me $15 a month with a PPO in the States, and $50 a month with an HMO…)

But as a visiteur, I can’t open a bank account in my own name, can’t have a cell phone plan that isn’t pre-paid, can’t work in this country, little stuff like that. Not sensible.

In France, marriage is not a given. Look at my hero, femmebot extraordinaire Ségolène Royal who, though raised a good little Catholic girl, lived unmarried for decades with her partner, François Hollande, with whom she raised four kids before they broke up a couple of years ago. What would be considered at best an unconventional arrangement in the prim and proper uptight and intolerant US doesn’t even elicit comment here, and it certainly didn’t stop her from having a successful career in politics.

There is something else about France that works for me in a big way, something else that I find incredibly civilized and sensible: religious weddings have no legal validity here. It is so refreshing to live in a place that has institutionalized the marginalization of religion and the religious. The theo-dictatorship of the Catholic church remains fresh in this culture’s memory, and religion no longer has any power here. (No wackjobs telling schools not to teach evolution!) They meant it when they said “separation of church and state,” unlike some other places I can think of.

So it’s the law that, if you get married, you must get married at the town hall before you are even allowed to have a religious ceremony. Many, if not most French people stop there, by the way, just like we did, if they go that far at all. More and more straight couples just decide to sign a PACS (civil union) to “make it official” (145K PACS and 267K marriages in 2008). Originally created for gays in 1999, the PACS gives French couples all the rights and privileges married people have, without the negative, bourgeois connotations of marriage. But it’s not quite as good a deal for immigrants like me.

So, yes, we got married because it was the sensible thing to do. But that doesn’t in the least diminish the sweetness of it. It was a marriage in the context of the epic romance of my life, in a magnificent, 19th-century, neo-classical building facing the Panthéon, during the sunniest and warmest part of an abnormally lovely October day in Paris fucking France.

Thanks to all my true friends for realizing how much it means and remembering our big day.

In the next installment, details about the totally random ceremony and some pics.

Watching a digital native bloom

Dogs don’t hibernate

Once a muse, always a muse(d)

November number four

How green is my Wiley

Artlessness

Let’s be sensible

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