Hidden Bookworld...

I want this, in my house.

Happiness

To explain the sudden influx of picture-posts, when I'm supposed to be doing assignments I tend to blog trawl and find pictures of things that are pleasing to mine eye. Not productive, but it keeps me happy :)

O do not love too long

This is sad, and retrospective, but I like it. It sounds like wisdom to impart to protect those you love.

But then again, maybe I just like it because Yeats was Irish.

You old so-and-so...

I jokingly refer to Oscar as my homeboy. But seriously.

(Not that I really know what a homeboy is...)

A Touchy Subject

I'm just going to come out and say it: I'm pro Gay Marriage.

It seems to be one of those recurring yet unresolved issues that circulates in national politics and yet holds international interest. We keep coming back to it, but can't seem to figure it out. Some countries have legalised it, most have not. In some countries, homosexual couples can be seen as de facto, but can't have a legally binding ceremony. And I don't really get why.

Being Catholic, I understand the religious doctrine surrounding homosexuality (and for the record, they're not against being gay, per se, just sex between two men or two women, because sex is purely for procreation which can only occur with a man and a woman). But I don't get why the government won't allow two people who love each other to get married in a civil ceremony.

What frustrates me is lobby groups who say that allowing gay people to get married goes against religious teachings, is unnatural, and undermines the traditional nature of both the marriage ceremony and the concept of the family.

To this, I call bullshit.

Marriage started out as a form of barter; it was a contract. As in, "I give you my daughter for that bit of land". The religious part came later, and if couples are seeking a civil ceremony, this is a moot point. It's not a religious ceremony.

Being gay is unnatural? It might not be the norm, but it's definitely not unnatural. It's as natural as me wearing glasses, being pale, or having curly hair. It's as natural as preferring white chocolate to dark. It's as natural as not liking Vegemite, or wanting to listen to Iggy Pop. It's an intrinsic matter of preference that is one of the most natural thing in the world, but for some reason cannot be seen as such. It's a classic case of "othering" - creating an 'other' that is not you, and failing to understand it.

And as to challenging the nature of the family, I fail to see the issue. Two people of the same sex love each other, and want to raise children together? I think that's awesome. There doesn't seem to be that much of an issue with single-parent families. And gay couples have to plan their children - they're not 'accidents', as they can be even in heterosexual marriages. I honestly think that children being raised by two men or two women who truly love each other is better than being raised by a man and a woman who can't get along, and who are 'staying together for the kids'.

Then there's the points that are often glossed over: the high divorce rate amongst hetero couples, the amount of straight couples who marry but don't have children, and the amount of straight couples who have children but don't marry. The latter two are never doubted as 'family', so why should a gay couple?

When it boils down to it, I think that if two people love each other and want to spend the rest of their lives together, a piece of outdated legislation shouldn't stop them. If gay couples can be recognised by Centrelink as being de facto, then why can't they take that next step if they wish? If they don't want to, they don't have to. But everyone deserves that choice.

Magic and Words

Art is not about thinking something up. It is the opposite - getting something down.
- Julia Cameron


I'm at the tail end of my study for my Art History image test tomorrow. Pretty good feeling. Anway, I thouight I'd share a bit of Signac. He never considered himself an artist, but he knew a lot of the Impressionists and Post-Impressionists in Paris, and clearly something rubbed off. This is his awesome painting "Portrait of Felix Feneon against an enamel background of rhythmic beats and angles, tones and colours", from 1890. Phew. I'm impressed I remembered that - I think that's the first time I didn't cheat and look at my notes!

But I digress. Here's the painting (it's a work of pointilism). Isn't it marvellous?

Then, because really if there's one thing I'm good at, it's distracting myself, I found a function on my camera that lets me take good photos of written documents. And let me tell you, it made my test notes look really good!

Artistry

I've decided that when I grow up, I want to be an artist.

I don't know what kind though - I love taking photos, but I think that when it comes to using my hands (in drawing/painting/printmaking etc) I need to take my mind out of the equation. That's always been my worst habit when creating - I think too much, and then my thoughts interfere with my work.

Really though, I love the idea of sitting in a room or outside (en plein air) with a box of paints or some pencils and creating something with my hands. Maybe that's a romantic view, but I think that the visual arts are something that can be romanticised and not lose their impact.



Hmmm. Something to work towards.

Matter of Fiction

I am a great lover of fiction. Not even good fiction - I'm not after critical acclaim, or existential enlightenment, or anything else, really. I read purely because I can lose myself in other worlds, and I love it. It's what I do to really make myself chill out during term time - which is probably why I read things that are usually pretty run-of-the-mill; dodgy, even. Not that I'm complaining with reading for school - on the contrary. I enjoy researching for my assignments (probably because I like what I'm studying, I think it makes a difference), and while I'm not always known to do my readings for my classes, I am generally interested in the subject matter and like learning things.

But...

When it boils down to it, I like crappy novels. I like romance - I like to know that the main character is going to get their romantic interest (or at least, the one who is best for them). I get caught up in adventure. I write myself into the book, and then feel as though I'm living it. At the moment, I'm reading Isabel Allende's Zorro, which is actually pretty good going. But, such is the nature of assessment and work and social lives, I don't get the chance to read that much. If I don't have any other commitments, I can rip through a novel in a day or two. But at the moment, it's taking me a couple of weeks. Which is annoying (for me), but really, as long as I get to snatch moments here and there to read something that I want to read - as opposed to something that I have to read - I tend to feel more like myself. I need it. I adore that sense of possibility that comes with opening a new book, or standing in a bookshop surrounded by unread paperbacks.

Nothing beats it.

Back to the Future

So, the day that Back to the Future went back to the future was about two months ago (6th July, 2010). This depresses me somewhat; I want a hoverboard!!

And as an aside, chicken-flavoured two minute noodles taste like childhood. I just made myself up some for lunch, and the memories came flooding back. Funny how that happens.

Wim Wenders

I adore Wim. Seriously.

Sex and violence was never really my cup of tea; I was always more into sax and violins.

Funny lookin' dudes

In my film tute the other day (we were supposed to be talking about Werner Herzog's documentaries La Soufriere and Lessons of Darkness) we went a little bit off topic from Herzog's particular brand of filmmaking and into rather more superficial territory. One of the guys in my class mentioned how he'd pictured Herzog as being this kind of crazy looking guy, with frizzy hair and a camera on his shoulder. Or with huge glasses. Or really, really ugly. Instead, he got really surprised when a quick Google venture showed him that Werner Herzog is a pretty average-looking man. He looks kind of like someone who could be your friend's dad, or an uncle, or something. Not like the man who seems to hate his female characters and once tried to hoist a ship over a mountain in South America rather than figuring out the waterways (for the movie Fitzcarraldo). And the guy in my tute had a point - turns out that most of us had pictured Herzog as looking more like Klaus Kinski (the actor he used in most of his films, and then later made a documentary about their stormy relationship called My Best Fiend. They're seen below, and I think this picture doubles as the DVD cover!)





I think what threw us is that it sometimes seems that being a little bit crazy looking is a prerequisite for making interesting films. I mean, look at Woody Allen. Wim Wenders (to the left). Even Jim Jarmusch (on the right) - who is one of my favourite people in the world, but admittedly, he looks a bit strange. As an aside, I really want Jim Jarmusch and Tom Waits to be friends with my Dad, because I think it would be awesome to come home and have them hanging out in my garage, smoking and listening to awesome music. Just saying.

What I find really interesting is that Klaus Kinski's real-life daughter is Nastassja Kinski (on the left), from movies like Paris, Texas. Now, Klaus is not exactly a good lookin' guy. But his daughter - where did she come from? She's gorgeous!! And Nastassja's daugher Sonja is even more attractive. As one of my very good friends would say, she's slammin'. Klaus must look at these ladies and be very glad with the way they turned out.

More Fassbinder

I think I'm a little bit in love! He gets it...

It's true, in Paris I sit in a cafe, drink, play pinball, listen to music and write my screenplays. In Munich, too, I always have the radio on; I can get up, watch TV, and so on. I have to have an atmosphere where I can get up and do something else. These incredibly white sheets of paper really have something terrifying, something paralysing about them if I tell myself they've got to be filled up with writing. For me, writing isn't a sacred act, to be carried out in absolute silence. I find writing strenuous, because you have to formulate in words something that already happened in your head.

That's the first time I've ever had anyone totally agree with me on that point. As an aside: I also think in fragments when assessment's due, like now.

Fassbinder

I think [the world is becoming a place where] people become more and more alike. And that means that individualists... people who react a little differently to reality have to ask themselves whether they can still afford to have opinions. Whether it's worth it. And that's where castration of the imagination begins.

Knowing the works of Rainer Werner Fassbinder, I don't think that was ever a risk for him.

Food

Food is one of those things... everyone needs it to survive, yet too much or too little can cause major problems. Some of it's ridiculously good for you, but tastes bad, and some is ridiculously bad for you, but tastes good. Today as I was blog trawling through the inter nets, I realised that food is one of those things that maybe shouldn't be photographed by just anyone. When it's good, it looks friggin' awesome. But when it's bad, it's enough to make you nauseated. Things like ice cream sundaes, for example, or brownies, or really cute cupcakes, tend to always look good. Ditto coffee. However, things like burgers, pizza, curry and bacon and eggs should only be attempted by the experts; if you get the slightly wrong angle suddenly the entire meal looks as though it's dripping in oil, grease and other things that are just plain nasty.

On a similar note, I'm here to declare my love of coffee and my hatred of Starbucks. I'm all for big, capitalistic corporations (!) but seriously. A little bit of finesse, please. I would like a well-made cappucino, not a piss-weak ginormous cup of milk and sugar topped with cream and caramel and sprinkles, with half a burnt shot of espresso thrown in for good measure.

Starbucks: Coffee for people who don't like coffee.

Whimsical dreaming...

I want to live in the world of Tim Walker.

He's a British photographer, working in London, who I guess you'd call a fashion photographer - but I think that to limit him to that would be unfair to his work and talent.

Anyway, what I personally really like about Walker's photographs is the whimsical, nostalgic nature of his images. They kind of feel like a childhood memory, filled with interesting shapes and soft colours - really, I wish my childhood had been more like his pictures. I guess as well, there's something that's remniscient of Alice in Wonderland; an endless memory that mixes reality with an undeniable sense of fantasy. Dresses that hang from trees, a room decorated with cakes, enormous cameras and toy aeroplanes, spiralling staircases, old houses, a gian swan being assembled on the beach at dawn, library camp-outs and bubble baths filled to overflowing are the kinds of things that feature in his works; while not often featuring children as the subject of the images, there is something that pulls the viewer back to childhood, losing them in memories that are half real and half dream.

A lot of his works remind me of older, medieval-reference stories and paintings, not necessarily in style but in mood. There is something undeniably old-world about his photos, which I really appreciate. He also has works in the permanent collections of the V&A museum in London (one of my favourite museum/galleries in the world. It excites me!).

I don't often gush over a single photographer in this way (with the exception of Annie Leibovitz, whom I think suffers from being overrated), but his works just affect me. It must be the beautiful people in surreal settings, the soft lighting and the pretty dresses. They also remind me of Florence and the Machine's video clip for "Rabbit Heart (Raise it Up)", which I think is just beautiful.

Maybe deep down, I just want to live a life of frivolity and tea parties; pretty dresses and make-believe. They've always appealed. But, for now, I'll be happy to lose myself in Tim Walker.