Very, Very

This girl is very smart, very charming, very beautiful and VERY fun to do a photo shoot with. You can see some candid shots here.

Manipulation

Here is what my dining table currently looks like. I've got sketches and paintings and ideas scattered about. I'm constantly thinking and planning and manipulating materials. I've been thinking how cool it would be if I could offer PHOTOGRAPHS and PAINTINGS. A few of my friends have let me use some of their photos to practice with and build up a bit of a portfolio.

April and Randall

While these are very rough, I think the talent for capturing a mood and a feeling and a face is there. And yet, I have the art of manipulating it the way that I want...playing with colors and lines and shadows in a way that I can't when an image is caught only on camera

Stephanie and Kurt

I've thought a lot about manipulation lately. It happens a lot. It happens with everyone and I've had a bit of it this week with someone I barely know, a man, who is trying to get me to date him. He is SO obvious in his manipulation...the compliments, the guilt trips, the slight phrases that are said to get a certain response. I keep wondering if the world of dating is rooted, somehow, in subtle manipulations? I only had a few interactions with him, but does he not see how transparent he is? 

Stina and Theo

Are you the type who can see clearly when someone is trying to manipulate you into a certain reaction or mood or belief? Do we manipulate ourselves? Can manipulation ever be a good thing? What is at the heart of it?

Spring Break Day 1

I am officially on Spring Break! I have been planning this for awhile. My original plan was to go and bum around New York with Michelle for the week. But as times are hard, I've been trying to cut back and save everything for rainy days and Paris...or rainy days in Paris. 

What to do with my free time? Read and paint, read and paint. That's my plan...A painting a day. Yesterday, I got those two out. I love them and I walked right into this fancy schmancy restaurant and said, "Hey, you have an open wall right there and I have just the paintings to fill it." And I showed them and now the paintings are up and out in the public. Kinda cool.

I painted the above painting today. Well, I started it late last night and finished it this evening. It's actually quite large and inspired from a photograph I took two years ago of one of my favorite couples. Since I have no romance in my life at present, painting "love" seems to be perfect food to feed and fill my romantic needs.
I liked it so much (it's quite large, about 16x20) that I put it up over my favorite antique (a dresser I've had since my birth...though it dates back much farther.) What do you think?
This one is smaller, but of the same couple. It's a 10 x12 with gouche (just black and ash blue). I love the comic book feel of it and the way her face turned out. Very sexy.

Wanting...

Here is what I created today. I am calling it "Same". I really like it. It's two separate paintings that will be placed next to each other. I'm framing them tomorrow and will be able to get some better shots of it with the good camera. These were taken under some bad lighting. But I like them. I like them a lot. I'm hoping that I can sell a painting or two in the next couple of months so I can finally have enough money to buy oils.
A lot of people have asked me what I want lately, truthfully, I've been the most insistent with myself. "What do you want D'Arcy girl?" I know what I should want. One part of me wants a PhD and to be powerful and smart and sophisticated. The other part of me would like to find that person that I could be with for a couple of years and have a kid...just one. Part of me wants to move to New  York to be in the heat of it all. Part of me wants to move to California to be in the cool of it all.

And yet, when I keep looking at what I want, what I really want...it's to help people. Plain and simple. I feel my profession is perfect for this. I feel I am good at it. I feel great pride and joy in my daily activities. But I also need more. I want to look at ways of donating my time to do more. I'm thinking of donating my summers to teaching English in Asia or Thailand. If I live frugally I could do this, without any other motive than to help.

When I think about what I REALLY want, I want to help people. I'm an educator. So, I'd like to educate. So many people, women especially, are searching for that, education frees. Sometimes I wonder if I don't need to seek after the prestige of the PhD or the cliche of a husband...and just wander the world, learning and living with it's people.

I'm looking to do this for summer of 2010. If you know any places that come to mind, let me know.

Family, Isn't it About Time?

So, an interesting thing happened today. My mother just called in almost a fit of tears and sadness. Apparently, my sister called her and told her that my blog is covered with pornography (which I find quite entertaining/disturbing on several levels). My sister also told my mother that I was bashing the church, the 12 Apostles, and that I used the F-word every other word. I am not kidding, this is EXACTLY what my mother said to me. Now, given my families penchant for drama, I'll believe that my sister said about half of that.

My mom and my sister. They've never read my blog actually. I really only know of a cousin or two who occasionally checks it. Other than that, no one in the immediate fam besides April. Thus my freedom to discuss and talk and not worry about any repercussions.

So, back to this moment...my sister just printed out my last blog to give to my mother who doesn't know how to use the internet very well. They know I've not been active, but I've never given too many reasons because I know that they wouldn't understand. My mom in a fit of tears and frustration, just dramatically shouting "But why?! Why would you want the priesthood?! Why?!!!!"

It is the easiest thing for me to say, "Well, women need the priesthood." Because to me it sums up much of what I feel and see in the church about the patriarchy. Maybe I don't REALLY want the priesthood per se, but I do want more. I don't know how to voice that I feel hurt in a religion that doesn't hurt them, that I feel confused by a religion that doesn't confuse them, that I feel put down and trod upon and used and slapped, and lied to by a religion that has lifted, helped and loved them. And it does not help that they know very little about the actual true church history and the deeper doctrines, in response to this my mom said, "Well, I have more important things to do everyday." So, again, it's hard to get my point across with this type of "I'm right, you're wrong" attitude.


My mom confessed that she feels I am falling away from the family. With my family I don't mention a lot of ideas because I know no one will converse with me about them or even understand them. I am happy, simple, kind, the peacemaker, and when my mom or sister say things that I utterly can't agree with, i just smile and nod. I know, hard to picture me like that. But truly, it's the Pollyanna image I've cultivated for years as an active LDS/return missionary.

I've seen my family about 5 times in the last two weeks, so I'm not falling away per se, but I did finally confess to my mother something as well.

"Well, Mom, you don't really know me."

And then there was silence. And neither of us knew exactly what to say....


So she went on to tell me that Obama was the Lenin of our time, the Hitler and the Anti-Christ all in one.

Way to find some common footing mom.


But mom, as you read this, just think. Think about it. You've raised a daughter who is happy and accomplished, a daughter who seeks to do good and spends her days teaching children to think important thoughts. You've raised a daughter who has loved and traveled the world and embraced everyone...no matter color or creed with love and acceptance. You've raised a daughter in tune with her spirituality, a daughter who thinks on her own, a daughter who lives authentically and not how anyone else wants her to live. You've raised a daughter who is true to herself, who loves her family, who loves God, who is trying to do her best. Really, mom, just remember, you've done a good job with me. So, sit back, take a deep breath, and let's try to get to know each other, ok.

Am I Pornography??

(This was taken from a post over at Zelophehad's Daughters...some awesome, rocking ex-mormon/mormon feminists!)

A major voice in the LDS church recently said, 

“And young women, please understand that if you dress immodestly, you are magnifying this problem by becoming pornography to some of the men who see you.” (Elder Oaks, April Conference 2005)

To me, this quote raises a troubling, unsettling issue for me as a woman. I don't really know exactly how to voice it, but I'm gonna try.

Elder Oaks centers his ideas around very specific gender roles. Men are the ones who are continuously subject to their sexual urges and women are the ones who hold the power to control men's sexual urges.

To Elder Oaks’s credit he does qualify his statement, not alleging that women are themselves inherent pieces of pornography under all their clothes, but only that they become pornography to some men. Yet, I still find myself completely troubled by this statement in general. 

Does the focal point of pornography reside more in the object instead of in the action of gazing? I mean, isn't the definition of pornography that of an image viewed in a particular way, and not a particular person?

I could pose the question, what exactly is wrong with pornography? Is it ok in moderation? Is some pornography, that of various photos better than full on videos depicting random and wild acts of sex?

I think the real problem is the complete and utter objectification of other people that pornography tends to promote. People (women mostly) soon become viewed as tools capable of satisfying the viewers own desires rather than seen as actual people with desires of their own.

Is pornography the opposite of charity? Of selflessness? Of purity? 

In the above statement, however, women’s subjectivity has been conveniently elided. Men are potential consumers of pornography, where women are potential creators (even unwittingly); thus, men’s obligation is to eschew viewing pornographic material where women’s obligation is to eschew becoming pornographic material. Men are sexual subjects where women are sexual objects.

In short, by framing his discussion in this manner, Elder Oaks has replicated and perpetuated the very dynamic which is problematic about pornography to begin with.

Too bad.

For discussion fun:

I've dated several men this past year and most of them, in fact, all but one, admitted to watching pornography in some form or another. Do you think this is just a right of passage, a normal part of everyday life? Is it something we need to learn to accept rather than condemn? Or is it something, as women, we should shun and leave room for a NO EXCEPTIONS type policy?

Also:

I was recently rereading Persepolis and there is a part when the women have to go back to wearing the veil because their hair is seen as too much temptation for the men in their country. That, in fact, they were walking pornography when they had their hair showing. I am concerned, honestly, that in some respects, the LDS religion seems to be embracing this idea and leaving the residual feeling in the hearts of women that THEY are part of the problem.

Utah is Number One

Utah is NUMBER ONE in anti-depression consumption. Yee-haw!

Psychiatrists point to several factors that could contribute to Utah's high levels of depression: limited mental health resources, restricted access to treatment as a result of cost, poor quality of resources and a varied list of other factors, including an under funded educational system and a culture deeply rooted in the Mormon faith.

"In Mormon culture females are supposed accept a calling. They are to be constantly smiling over their family of five. They are supposed to take supper across the street to an ill neighbor and then put up with their husband when he comes home from work and smile about it the whole time. There is this sense that Mrs. Jones down street is doing the same thing, and there is this undercurrent of competition. To be a good mother and wife, women have to put on this mask of perfection. They can't show their tears, depression or agony," Canning said.

"Obedience, conformity and maintaining a sense of harmony" are unspoken but widely recognized behaviors, which all contribute to what he calls "the Mother of Zion syndrome."

Salt Lake City is rated the most VAIN city. Three Cheers!!

Yep, not New York or Miami or L.A...but little ole' humdrum SLC. 

SLC earned this distinction, in part, because there are at least 45 plastic surgeons practicing in Salt Lake City, or six per 100,000 people, according to Forbes. Part of our bounty could be attributed to the University of Utah's School of Medicine, which offers residencies in plastic and reconstructive surgery.

The other part of the ranking had to do with our at-home beauty regimens. In the last year, locals spent more than $2.2 million on hair coloring, $116,478 on hair growth products, more than $2.5 million on facial cosmetics and more than $4.4 million on skin-care products. Our spending exceeded that of similar-size cities.

Oklahoma City, for instance, spent only $172,080 on hair coloring, $9,323 on hair growth products, $190,820 on facial cosmetics and more than $400,000 on skin-care products, according to Information Resources, a research company that tracks cosmetic and toiletries sales.

What does this say about us? That we care a million (or two) more times about what we look like than the people in Oklahoma City? Or, as the article suggests, are we vain? Or do we just place a premium on looking good? OR ARE WE ALL JUST FU**ING INSECURE?!? Hmmm....


And finally, our proudest moment?

Utah NUMBER ONE in online porn subscriptions! Whoot! Whoot!
And friends...I gotta lot to say about this one...but that's it's own post!

May I politely ask this religious state what in the world is going on? Does an emphasis on perfection lead to horrible insecurities? Does an emphasis on chastity and loving, lasting relationships cause the porn subscriptions to sky rocket? Are we all just awkward and backwards? Seriously, what is going on?