ॐ

The following is written only so I don’t have to talk about my last month and hash it out endlessly to all the people I know.

Before I moved to Portland I was squatting, and I had lots of energy and time to make art, but not enough supplies. It was a happy time in lots of respects. Freedom to roam, to muse, and shout way past midnight. Yet as far as art goes, everything I worked with felt like it had to count, since I had next to nothing to play with. No room for experimentation or growth, it was suffocating.

It was time to try something else so I came out west. Portland, which was very successful for me in a number of ways, the compromise of wages took more than its fair share out of me. Even when I had money leftover, it was hardly enough for the glut of supplies I need, and I hardly had the time or energy for it at that point anyhow.

Looked back at the equation, shelter was still the biggest bill to deal with, it makes me waste the most time submitting to employment.

Meditating on my options, I thought that living simply in a cabin I had access to in Connecticut would be a good idea. I could work just enough for the essentials, and be able to focus on my art.

Work in this case meant doing a variety of things on the internet. I could spend less than typical part time hours and make enough to cover everything, with a surplus.

A sound idea I thought. Problems set in. There is no internet access at the cabin by any measure. The only option that worked was both too expensive and too lackluster in quality to make a difference. It took a while to get the power turned back on to even be able to figure that out. Beyond that, parts of the roof are rotting. Plans to insulate and fortify the structure for winter and against the insects were proving to be worthless. We even thought about demolishing it and building a new place, but a nice house without an internet connection is still unacceptable. Even if I could go offline, my fiancee has her own aspirations that require decent internet access.

So that got fucked up. I couldn’t set it up beforehand. I feel stupid anyhow.

The plan then became getting an small apartment two hours away from NYC. Near some good friends I missed. The reality of the equation set in. I wanted to vend art on the streets of NYC, but I didn’t actually have any on hand, and leaving my income that variable did not make me comfortable considering I have a responsibility to my fiancee to not be a total fuck up.

Maybe in time things could have worked out, after a long period spent perparing and hoping that just maybe I will get time to create art on my own terms, for what may be a breath longer than a brief moment, at some indeterminate point in the future. Fuck that.

It occured to me that the only option left is that I submit to another mechanism I have tried to avoid. Crippling debt.

I am coming back to Portland to go to school, to begrudgenly purchase time to make art, from the fucking man, in the form of college loans. In Portland it is easier to get by for a whole host of reasons. Anyone who is native to the east coast understands this implicitly. I would have liked to settle somewhere inexpensive on the Oregon coast rather than sheepishly return to PDX, but there are no schools over there. This reality is unfavorable and dissatisfying, but is the only choice left before giving up entirely.

At least I can say that I am coming back with more than I left with, and that I am willing to take chances with the course of my life for the sake of my craft.

I’m not going to stop searching for my oasis in this desert, from one mirage to the next.

Maybe I can make this Portland I’m coming back to different than the one I left from.

Just threw this down.

Anyways, I moved from Portland, OR to Connecticut.

Lots of plans and stuff to explain, but not now!

The girlfriend asked me to do something with her tastes in mind, but in my own style, as something that would make a good tattoo, so here it is.

Drawn and then colored digitally.

Sitting on lots more art over here, new scanner is just sort of crappy.

Sometimes I like to pretend that the little demonic impish fairies I conjure up in my art are djinn that I have captured, not in a bottle, but in 2D.

They often feel like conflicted creatures, enlightened, but struggling with it as a burden upon their burning desires.

This was sketched automatically for the most part, for those of you who are interested in the whole Spare process. Sketched, inked, water colored, a little color penciling, and there you have it. Around letter size on bristol board.

I will sell this for the cost of a scanner, but really I would like to trade for one and save the trouble of shopping.

This piece has magickal power, and if you hang it up, its will increase your libido tenfold. If your libido is already awesome it will probably make you rich instead.

I’m a wizard, mind you.

Just posting this to bump my RSS readers and let them know I changed my
site. Its very gallery oriented now.

I’m almost finished with a site for my man Arun, which I’m pumped about
since I love his art. He is the only guy who does visual art that I feel
like I have a kinship with in terms of style and execution.

Anyways, don’t you love this photo? Would you believe the sex on my shoulder
wasn’t planned? That’s just how it goes for meta-pimps like myself.

Its so nice out today. I’m on my way to work, and I’m feeling sick sick sick
that I’m not in the park making water colors with some friends at my side.
So it goes.

Quick and dirty upload of something I’m working on. I’ve been inspired by the tribal peoples in the regions where Russia mingles with Persia. I guess it is only ever in this sense that I’m okay with my style being called ‘tribal’. ^_^

Anyways, still no scanner here, so this was drawn, photographed with my phone, and then colored in digitally.

Had fun here doing the billowy outfit. I’m happy with how this one came out, but a better iteration is underway.

Tell me what you think!

More crayola.

Anything with this color scheme looks halfway decent no matter what it is.

The dark hado. Oh snap.

Crayola markers on printer paper, while waiting for the trains to start
running.

Crayolas used to be my primary medium when I was a raver, way back in the
long long ago.

Tossed this out in a few minutes, only because I haven’t made a blog post in
a while.