Undergrad Visual journal pages, VCA, Melbourne, Australia, 2006Last weeks of my Summer TA ship. A few weeks of summer break left to treasure. Meetings, schedules, deals, ideas, thoughts, irrelevant problems, sudden gatherings and a general cool down before the major heat up of school avalanche.Let me do this, let me be oh so hopeful and shiny! As I re-read some entries, some type of naivety and happiness shine through. A hopefulness. I am aware of this sudden "niceness". Nice? I am known to be mean. Katya, but you are always angry about something? Aren't you? Yes. No. An angry displaced young woman of strange origins, confused cultures and accents?
Is it possible, just slightly possible, I might be happy? Actually, too happy ? Oh, God. Struggle, struggle, suffer. Oh trust me, I do. Perhaps, the mere fact of being "somehow allowed" to actually "do" this life I always wanted is translated onto the screen page. Sensations of hope.You will be OK. Or not. Perhaps not. The anxiety of truth. Shall I speak of it?
A is for artist. Scarlet A.
....Autobiography? Perhaps not. Personal Dichotomy? Perhaps. Struggle with adjectives versus struggle with the world. anger? are you angry enough, hungry enough? or just decadent happy, privileged in your right to make art and oblivious to the world's demise. Ugh please!!! Pleading for my own case of niceness, yes niceness. Not a word for art school. Not a word for art.It is a glass of strawberry pinkish lemonade. refreshing. Allow me to indulge. Caring little. Laying low and deadly. Let me breathe slightly.
Growing up in Soviet Union, amongst bare minimum I craved decadent bourgeois life, riches and fame and glamor and glitz and yes happy creamy pink coffee ice cream love life. I wanted to have my cake and eat it too , and what a cake I imagined it to be. That cake had massive amounts of butter cream and coffee soaked sponge layers and cherries on top. Sweet and mine. What can be more decadent and less decadent than being an artist.
A young admirer, an old admirer, fake and untimely marriage proposals, unnecessary I love you's and lies. Nothing is ever right. No white horses or Heroes. Dance, sing and paint.Semolina bread, guacamole dip, cherry tomatoes, grapefruit juice, pomegranate juice, espresso, scrambled eggs, blueberry yogurt, light yogurt with berries and chocolate pieces, green tea, spinach and cheese ravioli pasta with olive oil garlic and tomatoes, red pepper.
Sometimes, it is about sitting on the bed, watching videos one after another, taking a strategic walk to the shops for food. Back up the stairs. bed and videos. Sometimes there is nothing better in the world, than that. fashion collections streaming. Sometimes a book, a thought. Sometimes messy and sometimes clean. leave the field watch it grow. The universe will spin. Do you care? No. Great. Now, you can be. Does it matter when they look, stare, judge, assess? No. That nose of yours, you can breathe through it? great. once upon a time you had a clothes peg on it. put it up put it up. don't you want to be blond with green eyes and long black lushes. tall? yes. so does everyone else possibly. would life be so much easier for you then? they said "ugly" girl was gang raped in the cellar of that building. do you know where you come from?
nostalghia. The flame in your hands. do I carry this strange awkward and ghostly flame? memories that are fading, history in the making of your own cinema of visions, forgotten or repressed, blocked or laying dormant: does it matter?
nostalghia...Tarkovsky's pain. I am somehow cured. however it is always present as an underground layer of cherry homemade jam. A river of it lazily floating in my veins. How can I talk about it? what is my history? what have I been a part of? a world of migration and adaptation. a world of Diaspora, unwillingly admitted. joined.
I used to heartache all over. The meaty noise of soul-pain. the hum of native tongue songs flying and dying , the borscht, the pickled tomatoes... Sundays: potatoes and herring breakfast, coffee...pancakes..yard running, gossip, nails..bright pink shoes, first high heels, do they stick their tongue into your mouth..disgusting...cigarettes? stolen.
DVD movies:
MAX,
Basquiat,
Art School Confidential
Sirens
Lovers on the bridge
NYC, 2008
