Poetry Reading

So yesterday I happened to hear on the radio that Latino Poet, Martin Espada, would be doing a poetry reading from his newest book at Aunties Bookstore. Of course, "Latino Poet" piqued my interest, so I decided to go. All day, I asked myself what makes this guy a Latino Poet, and not just a poet who happens to be Latino?
I was hoping perhaps his readings would be themed about Latino culture and issues, perhaps even some Spanish poetry. In his favor, I'm hoping he avoided those poems due to the blindingly white audience. There were a couple of interest though, one about Puerto Rico, his home. Another was about the first Thanksgiving with his wife's family. The latter poem felt like the standard jokes though, about culture clash between ultra-wasps and a Puerto Rican who thought all Thanksgiving dinners had rice and beans with turkey. All-in-all, I wasn't thrilled.
I was even surprised there were hardly any Latinos in the audience, it was a a blanket of blanco.
They probably all received word it wasn't worth supporting and failed to inform me.
Lastly, his reading/speaking voice was hard to handle. I guess that's why writers write, so speakers can speak... He'd phase in and out of a rhythm, and sometimes even slightly sing phrases, all while tapping his foot and swinging an invisible pen in the air as though he were punctuating his voice or conducting an imaginary band. What made it worse was his vocal styling. I think he got lessons from movie commercials. His voice would go from raspy and whispery, to loud and too close to the mic. If you've ever seen an awful poetry reading at an open mic night, that's how this felt.
Of course, ending the poetry reading really made my day. I walked out to my car and had a ticket on it. I guess after 6:00pm, the parking meter I was at becomes a taxi use only spot. Whoops. So that's $30 I have to fork over for an awful night.

I'll be blogging again shortly, a lot has happened since the last blog post, I've just been too busy to write it all out.

Lost Small Note Book (Moleskine)

Saturday, April 25th, anywhere from 7:00 - 11:00pm I lost my black notebook (technically a moleskine). Somewhere around Sushi Dot Com, but now it could be anywhere. Inside the front cover has my contact info, the back cover has a pocket that even contains several of my business cards with my contact info again! It wouldn't mean much to you, it just carries my various notes, to-do lists, sketches, business cards, etc... It means the world to me, I'd gladly pay you for returning it. I'll even buy you a drink!
Let me know if you have it or have seen it!

It looks a lot like this one (without the weird cutout in the papers):

Journal Comic? First Day of work?

So, I was going to write about my first day of work, but instead I started thinking about the web comic I wanted to do but pushed aside to get my paintings done for the art show. Well the art is up on the walls, and I have time to do something. So, I thought of a compromise, how about a journal web comic? The American Elf journal Comic is actually a lot of fun, even inspiring. I've also been listening to a podcast from the Savanah Art of College and Design, and a student also maintains a journal comic here. So, now after some thought, I think I am going to do a weekly journal comic and see how it rolls. I'm already working on one that is about DAY1 of my new job. I'll try to get it up this weekend, I'm putting more time than necessary into it, but this is the first time I've done anything of the sort, so I'll just have to roll with it until I come up with a standard way of doing it. We'll see.
Anyway, I'm having trouble kicking my graveyard schedule, as you can tell by the time stamp on this blog entry, it is around 3:00am. I worked all morning from 7am - 3:30pm, drove home, stopped at the comic shop to order some trades, then ate dinner. Afterward I decided to take a nap, but instead I crashed hard core from 4:30 - 11:30pm. So now I'm wide awake, but I'm going to try to sleep a couple more hours before starting at 8:00am. I should be fine tomorrow for work, but fighting my sleep schedule is going to be worse than I imagined.

PS, I forgot my wallet on my first day of work, so when I swung by The Comic Book Shop, I was only able to make orders for some books and couldn't buy a damn thing. This was actually kind of cool, but also equally frustrating. There were pretty books all over, but I avoided "The Gauntlet" of marching back and forth in front of the new released comics rack. I promptly made my orders and ran away to not be further tempted. I've been buying more comics than I thought I would have ever when I got back into comics about a year and a half ago. At first I thought I'd pick up one or two subscriptions and the occasional trade. Now I have 7 comics in subscription, and I'm always grabbing more than I want when I leave. I think I'm going to have to come with a list, and stick to it to avoid over purchasing, I just don't have room for these silly funny books.

Goodbye Graveyard Shifts, Hello Daylight

Today, I am officially a day person who will sleep at night, and see my friends and family like regular people. I will not be resting in a dark dark room while the world frolicks in the daylight, like a vampire. This is a phenomenal moment! I start my new job as a patient transporter bright and early Monday morning!

The Art Show was great!

So, I had the reception for my art show at the Empyrean last Friday. It was a lot of fun, so many friends came. I've never done anything like this before, so it was nice to see so many friends come out to support me. I sometimes feel like I don't have many friends, mainly because I don't get to see them because of my job's hours(which will soon be remedied), but seeing so many people come for me on Friday made me feel like I was on top of the world.

It was so much fun to talk with everyone about my art, I had people ask me all sorts of questions. I was able to meet the other artist there, he was a really nice guy. I also was able to hear some unfiltered opinions of my art as I overheard people chatting away who didn't know I was the artist. It made me feel really good to hear what everyone had to say. I always worry that friends just tell me they like my work because we are friends, so now I have a better idea of what strangers think of my eccentric paintings :)

From what I hear, I think the tattoo shop next store to the Empyrean wants to buy my Street Fighter paintings. I'm prety stoked about that since the painting is 4' x 3', I wouldn't know what to do with it if I had to bring it home! :) I priced it at $400, which is a really low figure too, considering the endless amount of work I put into it, and the massive size of it. Actually, all of my paintings are pretty cheap in comparison to what others are trying to sell for. I guess it means I'm a cheap whore then :) But honestly, I'd like to sell my paintings and know someone will hang it up and enjoy it, so if I have to settle for a slightly lower price than what others sell for, its fine by me.

Again, I just want to thank everyone who showed up, it meant a lot to me to see all my friends in one place!

Art Show!

I finally wrangled an art show at the Empyrean. Originally we were shooting for May, but then they called me the day after I talked to them and asked if I could do April instead. I guess the person they had for April flaked out. It's a bit sooner than I'd like, but it just means I have to work that much faster, I bet some of the paintings will still be wet as they are being hung. Don't be surprised if you see me there touching up things on the wall with a paintbrush :D All week I've been painting like crazy. There's a 4'x3' painting that's almost done, and there will be some new works.

Anyway, here's the details:


Empyrean Coffee House is kind enough to display my art during the month of April. There will be an opening reception the first Friday of April, the 4th, from 6:00pm - 9:00pm. Stop by if you can, if not, the art will be hung all month long!

Empyrean Coffee House
154 S. Madison
(509)838-9819
Spokane, WA 99201

Movies about Art, not Art Movies

I rented the Thomas Crown Affair today, I wanted to watch a film about art and its really the only one I know of. There has to be more, so if anyone knows, please let me know!

While watching it today, I started painting a friend's family crest. He found a small image online last night to work from, so with that I hopped to it and starting work. My version is 18"x24", pretty respectable size. While painting it, I started to think about how much people would be willing to spend for a large personally painted family crest. I see shitty 'abstract art' all over town that sells for ridiculous amounts of money. Just recently I saw an 8"x8" painting trying to be sold for $250. I spoke with a friend about the thought of doing these family crests for a side job, and how much they could run. I'm thinking I could easily sell them for $500, especially if someone could buy 8" x 8" of acrylic vomit for $250. If I did 4 crests a month, I'd be making more from the paintings than I do from working. That's actually a scary and lucrative thought that I might just need to keep investigating. If I switched to part time at work merely for benefits, then painted 3 of these a month, I could really start getting a name for myself. I was even thinking, if I worked my ass off three days a week painting, I could get 5 maybe more done a month, and run the business online. I'm thinking out loud at this point, but its extremely tempting. I think I might try to do a couple more crests, and then have them with the rest of my work at ArtFest this year. There isn't better exposure than that, all walks of life show up for ArtFest every year in town, and a lot of those individuals are looking for art to decorate their homes.