hamburg: this city owns!

a few years ago, there was a jack daniels ad that was pitched at the rock crowd and it was all about silverlake, ca - a rockin' place to be indeed. but, having come to hamburg, i actually think it's the rockingest town in the universe and jack should live here instead (although, to be fair, astra is hamburg).


this place fucking owns! in real terms: i like it a lot. i've been out every night!
monday night to a club called Hafenklang (Harbour Bell?), which had a couple of OK bands playing, but the hightlight was easily the Punkerstammtisch (Ping Pong Punk, as my friendly sweet Du told me) - it was mental - about 30 punks/rockers playing round robin table tennis - it was the punkest thing I've ever seen! (spewing in public is not counted as punk rock, neither is dying of liver failure - just for the record). They played the coolest tunes ever and I wish I could have stayed until way, way later, but i was getting sleepy (at 3am).




then tuesday night i went to a Gorilla Biscuits gig. 'The Biscuits' are an NYHC [NewYorkHardCore] band and hugely influencial on the Thrash/HC scene from the 80s. They broke up a while ago, probably reformed a while ago too and Hamburg was the first night of the tour - it bloody rocked i tell you! I could hardly see, thank to having a BFG in front of me, but the vibe was excellent! And I saw the strangest thing ever (not anything to do with the Reeperbahn red-light district either) - the bar chick was absolutely wasted! I think she was smacked off her head and yet she was still serving everyone (slowly)! I'm not sure if that's exactly normal around these parts, but it was an amazing sight.


As well as those cool gigs, i'm staying in the rock'n'roll hotel, where the bar closes at 4am and breakfast is only served between 10am and 3pm, checkout at 2pm (none of this up before 10 business to catch a breakfast - ha!).

And, the coolest 'small world' thing in the world (better than the cute barista at flatwhite being friends with a good friend of mine from Brisbane) - I ran into Buggirl (band from Wollongong NSW who I know!) and Michelle from Tourettes, by chance in the Kombüse, burrito bar next door to my absolutley rockin' hotel! Talk about a mind-fuck - it was great! Hamburg totally supports its music and these guys can live here for months on end, working and survive as musicians (not something really possible in Australia).







And while I've been indulging in aural overload at night, during the day I've been checkin' out the visual miasma that is Hamburg. The city itself is a mad gallery - with great street art, sticker art and galleries galore (although I timed it incredibly badly with about 6 of the major spaces either closed during the early days of the week, or in the middle of installing, opening after I've left) and yesterday I wandered around town, getting supplies for an artwork and some mischief I got up to on the streets of this city – trying to find red stockings (rot Stümpfhosen) isn’t easy, even in the red light district of hamburg! but it was a good opportunity to see a little bit more of the city. I went to the city centre, where all the high street shops are, which was good to see – near the townhall, and I wandered around Jungfriedstadt station – which is where a tributary of the river cuts through the city – it’s like a northern Venice.



I made it to the Kunsthalle, and saw Seestücke (Sea Stories), which was a great exhibition about artists’ relationship to the sea. My favourite works were the Anselm Kiefer works and the video of the Vienna sewer trip (giving a heavy nod’n’wink to The Third Man) by Hans Schabus, and the intense film of an atomic bomb on Bikini Atoll, called Crossroads by Bruce Connor

A surprising highlight was a painting of a young man in a Weimar street lighting a cigarette -a German pastime- by Hans Speckter (Gang in alten Anatomie in Weimar, 1882). It was such a simple composition, but was painted so beautifully. I could have looked at it for days. Another highlight was Jenny Holzer’s Ceiling Snake, a site-specific installation of LED words, winding their way up the ceilings of the gallery hallways in both German and English. I love Jenny Holzer’s word-works, so it wasn’t that hard to like. I didn’t like so much not being able to see the permanent collection for free, but hey, I dealt with it.



Then I went looking for a place I’d heard about in Altona and didn’t find it – wandered around there for a bit, then walked back to the hotel from there. Nothing like wondering around for nothing to make you feel at home.. ha! I spent some of the evening making some artworks and also caught up with Tim Keil, a planner from Hamburg via Munich and back to Hamburg again – It was great to do another planner/blogger catch up over beer and rockin’ toons!


After Tim headed home, I went out and make my würstgeschaft work overlooking the harbour. I wish I had time to photograph it during the day, but I had to jump on a train to Berlin this morning. I already missed 2 trains and just had to head there. As I write this on the train to Prague, I realised that I just could’ve caught the train straight from Hamburg and given myself a bit of extra time to photo-document the work. Oh well.

My original plan, actually, was to see a little bit of Berlin before heading to Prague, but it didn’t work out that way. The train took an extra hour and by the time I got to Berlin Hptbhf, there was hardly any time, I went off in search of something to check out in the city, but all I got was beige Bundestag city buildings that left me feeling a bit Canberra. I took the opportunity to lie on the grass instead and then went back to catch the train (which I almost missed, thanks to both automatic baggage machines being betrieb (ja, beide!), but on the plus side, me and another girl in a similar position hit paydirt when one of the said busted machines gave us the jackpot in 1&2 euro coins! ha!



So, now, I’m in the Czech Republic only for a night before heading to Linz and Ars Electronica. I’ll probably post about Prague tomorrow. Thank you to Germany and her people, all have been most gracious hosts and I promise I’ll be back sometime soon.


As usual, there are more pics on flickr

muenchen, maeuschen

GartnerPlatz

The first 8 hours of a new country is always a bit of a write-off for me and Germany was no exception. Stupidly, I embarked on my new adventure having had only 3 hours sleep. I don’t know what I was thinking, but I did it. I spoke to Marcus at some stage, totally off my face with tiredness and in there somewhere completely chewed up any credit I had on my phone. Palaver, i tell you.

Skip to after I had a shower and a nap and then meeting Marcus at Hauptbahnof. Hugs all round, as usual.

We went off to find me a German sim card, which you just can’t do – I have my opinion on that, but I’ve shaken my head enough times in disbelief, that I’m going to leave it. Anyway, that didn’t work out, so we went off to try and get me a ticket to see The Gossip and The Crips. Sold Out. Completely, like no tickets, not even on the door – gutted.

SO Marcus and I went wandering, he gave me a brief walking tour of Munich while we went to find a place to have a beer (the non-alcoholic beer here is fucking brilliant!). And we spent most of the evening catching up, having a natter, and drinking beer. Good times indeed.

On the way home, I grabbed a lovely gelato and went back to the gig to see, if by some small chance, there would be someone with an available ticket, or something might have changed – not just because I’m a stubborn loser, but because if I hadn’t at least tried my hardest to get into that gig, then I would have had to shoot myself if I had have been able to get in.
So, sold out still being sold out, I walked back to Reichenbachstraße and hung out at Fur Freunde – this cool little club playing indie-type toons, on my own! It was kind of strange and I only stayed for a ginger ale, but I had a good time. The music was great and I strung my bad german together enough to ask the DJ who sung a particular song and solved the major quandary of who was responsible for the coolest lyric in pop music: I’ll do graffiti if you sing to me in French [Maximo Park].

Fur Freunde, [Photographic Manoeuvres in the Dark]

And so, after day 1, my top 5 first impressions of Munich (and Germany as a whole, ha!) are:


1. Cigarettes – Tabak. There are cigarette machines on almost every corner, everybody smokes and the Tabak Stand at Hauptbahnof not only takes pride of place, but is has an amazing display and range of the stuff.

2. Dogs. Everyone has one! They go on buses, in the art gallery, in restaurants, on the street, in the market – everywhere.

3. Bicycles. Like the dogs, everyone has one and they’re everywhere. You go anywhere decent and there are 50 of them all just sitting there. Initially I thought they weren’t chained up either. They are, but it’s not Fort Knox like the bikes in London.


4. Window Displays. There are the coolest window displays here. I took photos of loads of them, my favourite being not technically a window display, but a little cage, mounted onto a wall, with a beautiful hand-made leather brogue and a hand-drawn cardboard cut out of an old wireless radio, which also kind of looks like a handbag. And it has a sign in ornate script, Hand-Made Shoes from €250! Bloody gorgeous!

5. Beer. I know, cliché. It was going to be cars, because they also take pride of place here (with the big guns like Benz, VW, Porsche and BMW as the local wunderkind, why wouldn’t it), but the final place does have to go to beer. It’s good and absolutely everywhere.

UPDATE: I wanted to add in ‘Kissing in Public’, but couldn’t really squeeze it in – couples here just stop in the middle of the street and snog each other! It’s great (or a pain in the arse if you’re lonely at all)! I saw one older couple doing it that reminded me of my folks – how sweet!

ZK Max on Maximilianstraße

So, after a great night’s sleep, Saturday was officially the day of the most embarrassing thing that I have ever, ever done. Now, to put this into perspective, I’m not easily embarrassed, really. I’ve spoken to over 2000 people in public before without batting an eyelid and I’ll happily get up on a dancefloor and make a fool of myself, so that gives you a bit of an idea. And although I’m pretty aware most of the time, I do so some dumb shit sometimes. And this one, I file under in prime position Incredibly Dumb Shit I’ve Done and easily Most Embarrassing Moment.

I’m swanning around town, pretty pleased with myself, I’m communicating OK in German with various people, but a few times, got some seriously filthy looks from people. I thought it might have been the usual shit and I felt a little self-conscious, but nothing really to fuck my day up. I wandered around the HypoKunsthalle most of the afternoon, which was absolutely ace. (more on that in a minute), leave there, go to meet Marcus and Eva and plonk myself down on the ground on Marienplatz. Marienplatz is the centre of the universe as far as Munchen citylife goes – it’s the main plaza, the one with the stupid gold statue mime, the overpriced souvenirs and the Civic Building.
So, anyway, sitting there, see Marcus, big hugs again, meet Eva, it’s all wonderful and Marcus starts laughing and saying ‘and here’s Lauren, wearing the best jacket for where she his, well done love’… and I start wondering what the fuck he’s talking about – thinking ‘yeah, it’s cold, but that’s not it.. the ramones, my badg… oh, fuck.’ then I remember the very first patch I put on this jacket..



Yes kids, that’s right, in downtown Munich, Germany, home of the Nationalist-Socialist Party, with a huge fucking social wound about Hitler and gang, Lauren is sitting bold as brass, oblivious as hell, wearing an anti-nazi badge. FUCK!!! FUCK, FUCK, FUCK.

I was so fucking embarrassed I cried. Literally. I went a serious shade of red and wanted the ground to open up not just for me to disappear, but the whole of the day to be wiped.

I felt like the most ignorant and insensitive fucker on the face of the planet. Wearing an anti-nazi patch is important in the punk scene in Australia because there are still a few neo-nazi skinhead punks kicking around, and it not only sends a message to them about their beliefs, but it also clearly shows to them and the general public that I am not part of that sub-subculture. And sending out a message against Nazism is important, but really, I’m playing with fucking fire.

FUCK!

Anyway, briefly back to the Hypo-Kunsthalle for a minute.
Man, it was amazing! A really beautifully designed art gallery – the hallways, entrances and resting places were fantastic. They had really comfortable (gemütlicher) beanbag type things in the main entrance and the lights were cool, there was a great combination of inside/outside stuff and the toilets were ace! I didn’t take a sticker, but I might tomorrow.

Hypo-kunsthalle Kafe

The show was Von Rembrandt bis Picasso and technically it was earlier, let’s not quibble over terms. The art was a.fucking.mazing. Mostly drawings collected by two dutch collectors and featuring works from masters like Bellini, Picasso (obviously), Gericault, Delacroix, Giacometti, Degas, El Greco, Matisse, Basquiat, Bacon - you name it, the big guns were there. It was such a fantastic exhibition. What started off as a quick pop in for an hour before a nap, turned out to be 3 hours of looking, thinking, drawing. It was pretty intense, but oh so fantastic.

Then we had the realization of the stupid tourist moment..

And then that being sorted (I took my damned jacket of pretty soon after that), we went on to have a great evening. A snooty restaurant that made beautiful Spinatgnocchi, with nightmare service, and then bier at this really fucking cool rockin’ club near Marcus’ place – good times.

While I wanted to head out to Backstage, the reality of the situation is that I was exhausted and went back to the hotel to write and read, getting an early night before some more gallery hopping the next day.

Today (Sunday) has been a really, really lazy day. I got up early-ish to get my breakfast (best breakfast ever), with all the intentions of heading into town early. Then I got back to my room and decided that, actually, I just wanted to lie about, finish my book and have a nap again, like everyone else does on Sunday. Considering most of the shops are closed, I’m fine with that.

After some writing, I finally got my shit together and headed to the Haus der Kunst to see Gilbert and George with Marcus, Eva and their friends. Marcus and I had made an agreement to see this show way back in fucking June I think! And it was easily worth the wait.

It showed at the Tate Modern earlier this year and while I was a little bummed I missed it there, I’m so glad that I saw it here instead. The gallery was absolutely perfect for it – huge halls of open space, which easily accommodated the large grid works. I personally enjoyed the correlation between the grids of the works and the grids of the ceilings in the gallery (I’m like that, you know). The works they showed were amazing – their early stuff, right up until the late eighties/early nineties was fantastic – my favourite Gilbert & George actually being the one that’s in the Barbican at the moment, but best of this work was the video, Gordon’s Makes Us Drunk and the beautifully bound Red Sculpture Album, which I wished I could get into for a proper look at.

I felt quite awed by the intensity and sharpness of wit from these guys and realised how much my work and method was reflected back to me today, although way better executed that mine. I got inspired to create a large body of work in some form. And, like Marcus, I really liked the card/mail art works and am thinking about paper again.

All up, Gilbert & George, two thumbs up.

On the way to the Hausderkunst, I got to see the surfers on the river (wha’!) and after the show, we checked them out again There’s a killr swell, which after checking it out again post-exhibition, I’m pretty sure is man-made, but awesome nonetheless



Then we wandered leisurely through the Englisch Garten, which did resemble Hyde Park/Hampstead Heath-ish, but reminded me more of the kinds of gardens Dostoyevsky’s Idiot would roam through. We went to the Chinesischer Taum beergarden which was straight out of a goddamn postcard – it was great! Huge Steine of Bier, O’batzen – Pretzel with a cheese and onion dip, but better. And the trad Bavarian band who played polka-type toons, and Don’t Cry For Me Argentina. So, after spending a lovely time there, chatting, making a fool of myself and having a great time with Marcus and Eva, who were avoiding ‘We have to go to work tomorrow’ as much as possible, it was time to leave.

Eva and Marcus

And so, that, my dear friends, has been München.

To Marcus and the wonderful Eva, thank you so, so much for the lovely times we had – next time it’s Australia, please. And now, it’s off to Hamburg and probably Berlin, where you’ll probably hear from me again.

In the words of G&G, cheerio,


PS. I’ve uploaded most of my flicks to flickr, so for more pics, check them out there…

I'm off to Europe on Friday

and i'm taking..

the whole of the Mean Fiddler
a tennis ball
meine Hausschuhe
my tackle box
Jarvis Cocker and
a Paul Smith tie
a tattoo artist we can trust
a twin pack of toilet paper
a Happy Meal
my ironing board, of course
everything we need to make dumplings
my deodorant
a bottle of Evian water
a fucking big sombrero
a family pack of chocolate eclairs
my fingerless gloves
Nina's fucking electric guitar
NOFX's War on Errorism, on white vinyl
my bathrobe
rollerskates
the Victoria Line
an Oyster card
an A-Z
the lead singer from the Arctic Monkeys (with a whole bunch of condoms)
a wireless LAN connection
my ring
a Schnuffelhause
a pair of white boots
and one of those bicycle taxis.

should be fun!!

see you when i get back - I promise to write

pop, like a robot

thanks to popscene for the flicks

so on saturday, nina and i went to popscene on the cheap - we used the time out night pass to get in for free, drank free water most of the night (except poor nina payed £3.20 for a can of carlsberg sheiße) and danced like idiots - it was a fucking ball!

so much fun that i decided to post about it.

the fact of the matter is, i love dancing. it's fun, energetic, an opportunity to be as ridiculous as you please, so long as you're in time with the music, and an opportunity to listen to toons at 180dcb. the other great thing about music in clubs (with at least half-decent djs) is that you get to listen to music that is either good but not good enough to make it into your collection (like that one song from the second stokes album) or so good that it's a soundtrack to life.

in fact, i kind of took for granted how much it's a huge part of my life, until i moved to london. every week at the poxy oxford tavern in wollongong, my friend lulu (alana) and i would invariably choose our fave toons on the jukebox near the pool tables and dance the night away. we always had our favourites (because jukebox tunes are a category all on their own). most of the time it included i love rock'n'roll, some madonna, (kriss cross'll make ya) jump jump, boys don't cry by the cure and take on me by aha. they're not the best songs in the whole world, but they were awesome to dance to, especially at 1:30am, after the bands had finished. we really didn't give a toss about what anyone thought of us and by the time it got to jukebox time, most of the pub was too smashed to really care about a couple of broads doing hardcore moves to aha's take on me anyway.

so, moving over here it took me a while to find a club that a) i liked, that didn't cost the earth to get into and b) someone to go dancing with.

last month i went with dear friends alan and cath to club kali - the gay asian night at the dome in tufnell park. it was fucking awesome and i didn't get home until 4am - with sore hips from all that bhangra action. i had never danced to bhangra, but thanks to alan, got taught some basic moves and had the time of my life. i danced with loads of gorgeous gay indian and bengali boys and didn't care what others' opinion of me was. it was loads of fun and gave me a thirst for the dancefloor again.

and so, back to popscene on saturday night. being an indie night, there were loads of tunes i didn't know, but they were still ace fun to dance to: the gossip's standing in the face of control easily the highlight. i was slightly disappointed that they didn't play some of the older obvious indie tunes - even a bit of the cure and the smiths wouldn't have been that out of line*. and i felt really old when, instead of playing prodigy's firestarter as the kick off for the house dj, he played smack my bitch up.. the poorer and younger cousin by a country mile. we knew then, it was time to leave.

on the funny side, i discovered a mating ritual of the clubbing english male which involves them standing beside you until you talk to them, which was quite puzzling and so odd to me. in fact, i was so oblivious to it most of the time, i ignored them for most of the night - ha! poor dears.

but it did make me realise that future boyfriends will definitely have to love dancing - it combines all the great character traits: ability to make a complete arse of oneself in front of crowds, in style; love of music, especially up loud and played on vinyl, a bit of fun and fashion sense (although not so self-centered that they're stuck on the side of the club more concerned with how their shirt looks, rather than a cracking tune), and rhythm. and if you ain't got rhythm, you ain't got rhythm - if you know what i'm sayin'.

i was, however, shocked and amazed that most of the kids (ie boys) on the dancefloor were all young enough for me to be helping them with their homework! what happened to those around my age? when they turn 30, do they all just stay home and watch re-runs of the fast show? is dancing a female-only past time after the age of 26? does the fact that i'm even asking that make me ancient? have i become one of those horrible oldie types that is clinging to the vestiges of youth, while screaming out for some long-forgotten track by some obscure band?

oh god, i think i have.


*i'm not strictly a smiths fan, but will allow it in a club, especially an indie night. and if you feel the need to argue about the smiths, go to rob's blog, where he'll happily join in.

garnering empathy part II

I've been thinking about this for a while - ever since this post about empathy. i tried to find some proper academic literature on empathy, to try and understand it in terms of science, but failed to find anything. granted, i didn't look all that hard, really, just the manchester city library. but i promise i will in the future.

firstly, i've been thinking about how empathy with your audience (as an artist, musician, creative, whatever) is even more important than i originally thought, because it's actually a two way-thing. if you aim for your work to empathise with your audience, your audience will empathise with your work. now, that sounds both obvious and esoteric at the same time. but bear with me.

in spending time in galleries, as i do*, i've realised that when i like a work, i empathise with it, the artist, and what the artist is trying to convey. a good piece of art is something i have a relationship with, communication happens (which is more than being visually spat on) and for that to happen, there has to be a reciprocation of understanding, and empathy.

and in trying to figure out a little bit more about how to cultivate that empathetic flow, i've been thinking about language as the main conduit of communication. bring on roland barthes, levi-strauss and the other linguist/structuralist/deconstructionist theorists!

lately i've been hanging out with a few kids whose first language is not english and on one evening in particular, oehmchen mentioned that he thought that poofter sounded nice, rather than an insult. after our initial quizzical looks and then hilarious laughter, i realised the basis for this was actually because in his german pronunciation, it was spelled puffter, and puff is kind of nice, really.

and the reason i made this connection, was because i studied german in school, have a bit of understanding of their diction, grammar, etc, and could follow seb's reasoning.

which brings me to a realisation that i had, which may or may not be founded in anything other than bollocks, but i'm interested in the idea anyway. that learning a foreign language is a way to learn empathy. when you learn a language other than your own, you have to learn how to think in that language, using that particular language's structure, habits and pronunciation (codes, signs, etc). you need to develop a context for the language and in doing that, you begin to understand and empathise with others who speak that language... 'when in rome, do as the romans do' - to translate one experience into another.

these skills are all used when you empathise with others, and communicate using empathy - you think about how another may think, you concern yourself with the context they are in, you translate that to your own experience and (hopefully) make a choice based on that understanding.

like i said, it's based on nothing but a bit of thinking/imagination and trajectory, but i'm going to give it a whirl. please discuss.




*gallery per day is going through some conceptual difficulties at the moment, but i'll post some reviews here soon

and the girls light up..

a quick reminder before i crash out:

ladybloggers
@ maison bateaux
greek st, london WC1 (off soho square)
7pm

i'll try and do a facebook invite, but it might just be too late and i could also just be too lame to work it out tonight.

pass it on, would love to see loads of gals there. or just be me and nina having a laugh. heh.

Red thread private view

Just a quick update in the middle of a nutty week of social butterfly stuff (gigs, ketchups, beersphere, ladybloggers and hopefully a bit of bhangra in there somewhere.)

Last Thursday evening, Spinach held a private view for the installation, Red Thread and it was a really lovely evening (just like everybody said it would be) - I felt completely spoilt by Martin and the rest of the Spinach crew. Some wonderful people turned up - bloggery peeps, ad folk, acting folk, other artists and dear friends. Poor Nina (die Scheißeköpfchen) got lost along the way, but she was there in spirit. As were various twittery friends who sent me text messages, and of course my parents, who are always with me in spirit.

I've not had an opening/private view in which I just 'rocked up' to before. He Said She Said was close, but I still spent a bit of time helping organise things beforehand. This was 5-star treatment, which was great! I did a little bit of a walk/talk through the space, going through the process and some of the little details with a few people and got good feedback from everyone. I was even hoping for a bit of flack! I got up and did an impromptu chat in front of everyone as well, which i think i bungled a bit, but hopefully it made sense. True to form, Young Will took a photo of it. Thanks Will.

Some of the highlights of the night for me including a good chat with Tom [Spinach MD] who initially was feeling a bit 'challenged' by the work, but had come to understand it and relished the partnership of creativity and business; seeing that Claire had lovingly tied her red bauble to her office phone [which for me is a real sign of engaging with it, not just finding somewhere to put it]; having dinner with a fantastic bunch of people afterwards, where there was much lively discussion and really warm feel to the evening; giving out some presents [just like Satan Santa]; really feeling how much Ali and Francesca and Helen and others at Spinach really enjoyed having me around and found the work and the project really worthwhile - so much so that I'm going back for another day next week. yay!

bastard facebook

for those who haven't heard me bitching about this damned social network, have i got a blogpost for you!

everybody's on facebook now. it's no news. all my friends are hassling me to join, the suit walking down liverpool st is pontificating about why facebook is better than myspace, hell, even time magazine is writing about it. and and yet i dig my heels in. why?

because it totally shits me that facebook has just gentrified online social networking and suddenly, hey, it's OK!! myspace has been around for years and while i'm not one of those 'i've been doing it for years' type folks when it comes to this crap, what shits me about it is that all the 'adults' who didn't understand myspace, took the piss out of it, or just plain avoided it, are now on damned facebook. yes, myspace is rubbish. i know that. it fucks up a lot and is full of posing teenagers. but same goes for facebook - just posing adults and slightly better designed! it's just bloody AOR for online social networks, for fucks sake! huey lewis and the news for digital civilisation.

i'm sick of hearing people going on about the great things facebook does, like it's a whole new thing. it's not a new thing! jesus christ! i've been able to blag about my upcoming shows to my friends for years. we've been able to fill in stupid surveys about what our favourite colour is and whether we like tim tams or mint slices for a while now. in fact, i blogged on myspace before i blogged on blogger! oh. my. god! you can make a profile and say what movies you like? wow!! if i hear another person say "on facebook"...

and the fucking annoying thing is, more than all of that, is that i'm now on bastard facebook because i've had enough of friends hassling me. i'm resenting it like hell, don't you worry. and if i ever go on about the great things that facebook does (apart from the twitter widget, which has ultimately tipped the balance), please, shoot me.

'twas the night before christmas

when all through the house not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse...


well, actually, there is a mouse. in the kitchen.
and i'm stirring - well at least my guts are.
and it's not the night before christmas, but it's the night before the private view of my work at spinach.

but it'll do for now.


what i find most terrifying before a show opens (to the public) is not that people will hate the work, but that they will be indifferent, or indirect. i know that sounds like a cop out - 'it's not whether you win or lose, but how you play the game' type pragmatism. but i swear, it's true.

i would rather someone hate the work and talk with me about it, let me know exactly what piece of shit art wank they thought it was, than for someone to mildly dislike it, shrug, not even bother to discuss it - either with me or anyone else and leave or even worse, leave and then bitch about what a waste of time/money/space art is.

ok, so they may be right, but they could at least have the courtesy to let me agree with them! ha!

long black humour, a decaf soy latte and double mug shot to go, please..

"these are some serious times",
said the street stencil art, kicking around shoreditch lately.

"they certainly are"
said the sandwich board car bomb, hanging outside (belong) in port melbourne..