[my art]

i decided i want to blog. for real. i want to write my thoughts and put them out here. so, this is going to be my personal blog as well as the [agape light photography] blog. i understand it is a little crazy to mix a business outlet and the thoughts that come to me, and most people separate their lives into categories that don't mix, like foods on a plate not touching. the thing is, my work is my art, and like abstract expressionist painter robert rauschenberg, I want to "work in the gap between art and life." essentially, that's what photography is and where it happens. i can't separate the two, even before reading art theory. so here it is. my art, my life & my candid thoughts. i understand that the workings out of my mind & heart might deter some people from hiring me as their photographer, because maybe I think to deeply about whether a photograph is truth or a lie, and whether it shows real life at all. i'd rather be real, in an industry that focuses on the ideal. i want the truth...and love is the truth and it is beautiful, but it is not perfect. i think, really, that what makes someone an artist is what they think about art, or how they believe it, not what they make or even their skill. creativity is internal first.

this is going to be challenging for me because i don't like to share my deep insides with more than a few intimate friends that i trust. my inclination is going to be never to share this blog with anyone or advertise it now because i'm here too. it might be good for me though. so i'm trying it.

here goes nothing. actually, here goes something.

the reason i don't use capitals and i try not to focus so much on correct-ness, is that i've been freed from perfection. i'm quite intelligent, but i like words better this way. this is life, not an essay. i embrace mistakes. i'm wrong a lot. i like to learn.

i detest fake semblances of perfection so totally that the drivel i usually write in a photography blog post makes me ill. not that it's not true, but why do i have to speak a certain cookie cutter way about photographs, just because it is a business. i would rather have a business that is sought out for it's raw, real nature, not because it appeals to those who love to monogram things and brag about eating organic food and the like. i like all of those things actually, but i hate the idea that they could make me better than anyone else. i'm not better than anyone. i'm just loved. my problem is that i'm inclined to judge people who do embrace the image of the ideal, and that is not love either!

i got that revelation in art theory last semester at school actually. it was sort of a life changing revelation. we were studying karl marx and ideologies. i realized that for so long i've been judging people that like pop culture, commercialism, popular products and media (which i reject automatically on the basis that it is popular-hence i've never read or watched harry potter and i have no use for twilight.) i realized that the ideologies of nalgene bottles and chaco's, life is good and natural granola, shane claiborne and donald miller-are just ideologies and no different than a personal preference for gucci and lady gaga. people may prefer what they will! what right have i to judge anyone for liking what is popular and mainstream, even though i prefer indie&bluegrass music, nature, and natural textures, color & light? it's all ideology. i think i'll dance to anything now. and if someone wants to have a manicure that is a bit too long for my taste, and an expensive juicy couture bag that could be sold to feed scores of street kids in mumbai, i should have no judgement in my heart towards them, and how silly that i used to offer them judgement when i have nothing but admiration for my friend with an (albeit functional) hiking backpack with built in water pouch who actually spent a bit more. just a thought. when i realized that i am not better than anyone it set me free. not to feel badly about myself but to LOVE and to embrace people for all of their individual tastes, none of which is better than any other.

after this revelation i made an art project about it in my conceptual approaches class. i made quite a few projects in that class that worked things out in myself and did not document them. i am a little sad about this, but i have no regrets since i am able to let them go. (another aspect of photography, especially my stop motion videos, is the almost fearful drive to capture and record everything so that it won't pass away. sometimes it's gone and i am left with thousands of photos but i never really lived the experience because i was so bent on keeping it for later. i have to learn the balance of living in the moment and keeping a bit of it forever. more on that later.) the ideology project was the final, and the idea was that i wanted to reject the pressure to make something better than anyone else in the class, better than anything i had made before, and to be the most clever conceptual artist anyone had ever seen. what i wanted most was to finish this class that had changed my life so much with a sense of resolution, to leave the door closed and let it be finished. to make something that i was satisfied with. something that meant something to me. the project, which i called "seven year sacrament" consisted of bubble tape, candles and communion cups. on a pedestal i set up the candles and communion cups, which held rolled up scrolls of bubble tape that said iamnotbetterthanyouarenotworsethanme on the front and my signature on the back. the idea of transubstantiation is that the communion actually becomes the body and the blood when taken. so by chewing and swallowing my signed artwork, people ingested the fact that i do not desire to be better than them, and according to urban legend it would remain in their body for seven years. i also had other cups with gum that read iamnotbetterthaniamnotworsethaniam which participants in my artwork signed themselves. the facts about whether or not gum is indigestible and remains in the human body is irrelevant...hence "art as idea as idea." here is a similar text to the one that accompanied the piece.

“Seven Year Sacrament”

For a long time I could not find peace in my spirit about this final project. I realized that the idea I was exploring would leave me with no resolution in a class that was a catalyst for much change in me. Many unknown aspects of myself were revealed to me through exploring these prompts, and through them I found a reason to make art and think thoughts I never would have otherwise.

Something was bothering me. I felt like I was leaving a door half open, that I wasn’t coming to the end in a way I wanted to.

ir·res·o·lute (-rz-lt)adj.1. Unsure of how to act or proceed; undecided.2. Lacking in resolution; indecisive.ir·reso·lutelyadv.ir·reso·luteness, ir·reso·lution n.irresolute [ɪˈrɛzəˌluːt]adjlacking resolution; wavering; hesitating irresolutely

I realized there was so much pressure to top everything I’ve done, and to have the most clever idea and the best project.

I don’t want to buy in to trying to be better than anyone else. I’m not better than anyone else. I don’t want to be.

So I want to take communion with you.

Do this in remembrance of this:

I am not better than you are not worse than me.

The opposite of striving is peace and rest, and my prayer is that the transubstantiation that occurs in you will be that you remember that striving to be better than others is not where you’ll ever find peace.

I want freedom from the pressure to be better than everyone else and better than myself. I won’t let that be my motive for being an artist.

I am not going to let art be this for me.

I don’t want to make art that never changes anyone or effects them for only a moment.

This is where I find resolution.

If you swallow my artwork, supposedly it will remain in your body for seven years.

another piece i made this year was called "nicole johnson" and it consisted of a piece of uglifruit (jamaican tangelo) with skewed barbie arms. one of the barbie arms had a diamond in it's hand that reached for a diamond covered airplane (a la damien hirst's For the Love of God.) airplanes have a special significance and i use them in a lot of my work, including the [i've come home] video at the top of my blog. the reason is a secret, but i will share more of my airplane work later. i just like airplanes. i do have a photo of the uglifruit piece that i will share later.

so here it is. God has been teaching me so much lately and revealing himself to me in new ways. i am learning so much and i feel very close to His heart. at the same time, it is hard to not know exactly where i am headed. really, when i graduate in one year i would like to go to mumbai and work as a photojournalist and love the street children. i just want to take care of them and teach them about Jesus. i'd go tomorrow. why mumbai? the first time i ever heard God speak to me He said "Bombay." one word. i was 12. i realize a lot of what God says to me is ridiculous, but His wisdom is greater than mine, and he can see all that i can't. i trust him. i'm realizing, because of the work of the Holy Spirit on my heart, what it means that God is good. i'm blown away by His love.

right now i'm making things out of glass and rope and driftwood from this, my secret place.