Sunday, June 30, 2013

being naked

recent weeks involve more public nudity than usual for me and in very varied circumstances. i grew up in a naked house; it still a naked house to this day and when i go there we all still as naked in it as in my youth. and my house, every home i ever had since leaving my parents' naked house, has become a naked house by default of my living there. friends know if you liming by me, you hadda be cool with me in my panty, because real friends doh ask you to put on pants in your own house. and bona fides know when they come by me, is to take off their clothes and lime in their drawers too.
but public nudity different. baring oneself onstage, or for nude drawing sessions, inviting the open scrutiny of strangers/acquaintances/friends/family you doh necessarily have naked-level relations with...that kinna nudity different. and i doh 'fraid it, but is something i choose to subject myself to in controlled situations not for thrills, but because i think what i learn is invaluable.
i am forcing myself to let myself be vulnerable, to allow myself to be not just nude, but naked, bare, wide open and unworried about whether my belly looks unflattering in this light, or my thighs in this position; i am telling myself to be unconcerned with others' perceptions of beauty and whether i fit them, to leggo all society have to tell me about black and women and black women, because i know, the dancer and science-nerd in me unite in the knowledge that at very least, by my very existence, i am an extraordinary machine; my skin and all it holds together is an amazement of beauty+function and there should never be shame in using it for enlightenment, in any of the many ways enlightenment can come through artistic endeavour.
i make myself take in the truth of seeing self through the eye of the beholder...drawing+painting sessions come with layered anxieties, 1st the obvious, of one's nakedness before others intending to scrutinise+reproduce (and the natural fear is, magnify) every perceived flaw and blemish, but then comes seeing what they show you you are. mirrors, photographs+film are nothing like seeing every part of oneself rendered by an artist's hand right there, live, in the moment, seeing your soft, previously-hidden places captured boldly in a 3minute sketch, a 15minute sketch, half-hour, half a day...the immediacy of their seeing and rendering exactly what in front of them strips away my ability to be precious about any of me. i allow myself to be drawn in "unattractive" positions, crouched, squatting, hunched over in contraction, to rid myself of any lingering whispers of being less than what somebody else call perfect somehow mattering...
i don't doubt it easier for me, knowing dance keeps this body i working with at least reasonably fit, but don't think any of us exempt from insecurities, and exposing them all in close quarters affects even the most confident. but this is what performers+artists do; we bare our souls so others may connect with theirs. this is my responsibility, for the choices i make to do what i do. this is part of how i keep it real, keep the journey to self moving forward; this is part of how i make/art/wuk.
keep it fresh.
walk good.
[read part2 on stripping bare and baring all]

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Friday, June 21, 2013

i finally get the stones to talk 'bout the mangoseed

lemme start with full disclosure: nicholai la barrie, frontman of the mangoseed is my bestest friend in the whole wide world since we meet@age10; he's the one whose wuk it is to buy a house so he could have a yard to put my dead body in and plant a tree on me. but since my ticket have an airfare component, seeing mangoseed live eh happen yet, and i know enough to know live is the real way to experience this band so i admit, i eh take in much of what my nico doing this whole 6years, except to know mangoseed building a following, doing ting like opening for manu chao, and mashing up the dance fine fine like chilli bibi.
but as they recording lately, every now+then a track will turn up in my inbox, and these boys making me sit up and pay attention. listening to their new release careful, the combination of drive+groove take me right back to the moment of clarity the 1st time i hear jointpop's urgent- not that they sound anything alike, is about how they make me feel...
careful set itself up in a mellow zone, slightly ethereal, the lyric come in somehow plaintive+powerful at the same time, a cybernetic chant, but just as you get comfortable in this kinna ambient space they invoke the clash of iron+steel and cut through the quiet; sharp, hard, and sweet. eventually the pacing metronome gives way to an easy but persistent drop, and mangoseed is in the pocket, and we wine for just a minute, before guitars come crashing and we get tough again. i very like this track. i even like nico's vocal, which might be the scariest part of listening to my bestest friend's music; what if i doh like it? because i hadda tell him the truth no matter what (and good ting i like it, eh nico, since you get no preview of this before i run tell the world)...but this morning when i hit play en route to water the plants on the gallery, not quite awake enough to remember wha' i was ponging when i bathe late las' night, the track come in and before it all click in my semi-sleepy mind i thought, "mmm, kinna sexy...who's that, boy?"...and then i knew, i finally ready to say something 'bout mangoseed.
and when i look good, i see they have mangoseed tv with live performance footage and videos and behind-the-scenes (nico+richard+karlos are silly, and not too hard on the eyes neither) and all kinna ting, so not only am i ready to say this band deserves a listen, i can link it up!
this (month-ago; scroll down, you'll see may24 2013) interview worthwhile because they perform a few songs acoustic, including 2 of my 3favourites, thief head and army of 1 (the 1st song i ever loved by nico) then they play careful, my other clear favourite.
and look mangoseed live+plugged-in thief head excerpt, and if you let it run, it should immediately follow with something else from mangoseed tv, which is how i find that shit...like yuhself!
big-up mangoseed for a happy friday!
walk good.

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Friday, June 14, 2013

kryptonite

reeling in confusion is how i wanna say i feeling but it sound so cliche in the voice in my head as i type...but seriously, i real confuse...or something wrong with me, because i cyah understand why people deal with me so. the unfriending seem neverending. sigh.
right. enough wallowing in this week's relationship crash+burn. wha' i really come here for is, sadly, what becoming more+more the usual...need to clear some tab-clutter. i eh go bother apologise for not actually being sorry, just share the wealth, quick+dirty:
gaslighting, in this context, i fighting to explain too often to too-dismissive ears even among people i usually consider relatively enlightened, like the other day's pps bonus share, good to see it well-expressed, bittersweet pleasure at the fact that it will have more weight coming from a man...
something silly now, because, balance; teachers doing what they can to preserve sanity...
and on the topic of youths and smart starts, never thought i'd speak of finnish babies sleeping in cardboard boxes as a positive, but sometimes reality brings lovely surprises...
until our government (as told by a journalist who has long frustrated me, which make the lash sting that much more) remind me that finnish babies-in-boxes not helping we in sweet trini as they sign we arse over to the usa but forget to send the memo to lewwe know.
to soften that blow, a wonderfully-written piece of flash fiction by a good friend.
and an article about onstage nudity that nailed something i wish more practitioners realised and reminded me how much i love the theatre, and why.
and because i want to close nowhere near where i open, some absolute feelgood; 1st video (local; big-up richard voisin), 4+ intense minutes of a sweet spot walking distance from my parents' house since i was 2 that inspired 1 of my favourite pieces of my own short fiction, written while i was in foreign desperately hoping my memory wasn' lying to me; so good to come home and find it hadn't...love me some blue basin, and they capture it gorgeously; 2nd video covers a foreigner's 1week trip here in 7minutes, she had a time and her vlog make me real smile...
i promise more actual writing next time...
walk good.

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Wednesday, June 05, 2013

new tings

aye! my 1+only sis, the original gremlin, now linked on a sidebar near you...
walk good.

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Sunday, June 02, 2013

i feel a little like a bad writer for this but i trying to edit and these tabs cluttering my situation. plus this blog for me 1st, ent? so i can find them again when i need, plus your enjoyment+information:
plenty similar/related articles/lists around, but this 38 wonderful foreign words we could use in english is my favourite collection.
one of my loves' most enjoyable essay on the evolution of the bat[man].
i may not consider it the root of the culture wars but this contextualisation of masturbation is worth a read, even though masturbation month done.
and i wasn't going to even bother putting my mouth on the ridiculous objection to the biracial cheerios family, but this too well-said to not share...
as is this, my favourite response to this kinna bullshit...  
oh! ps: just 'cause is my 1st sweet sentence of the day: kisskidee on my gallery peeping me jealously while i, in quiet morning light, devour my juicy julie...that badmind bird could eat all the worms he want; no amount of early-rising getting him a peck of this mango!
walk good.

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