forty seven: Speeding into the light of the Last Semester of the MFA. Last, but not least: Back to School.

Katya Grokhovsky, Status Update or How do you feel? 2011, acrylic on canvas.

Words fail. Transforming slowly back into the student.
Now. Anxious, annoyed and interrupted.
I keep thinking about my recent visit to Disneyland.
However, some kind of half formed and barely baked partly-raw and vile--sentences overwhelm me and I am not consciously capable of forming a written statement about the visit. Chaotic, overcrowded, over- marketed and psyched, elbowed and yelled at, fire-worked and paraded for Xmas.....lit up like a giant, yes, one of those Happy Xmas trees, spooned around and tossed aside.

I guess it was Fun Fun at the Happiest and most occupied -to- the maximum- human-capacity place on earth. I am pondering. Looking at Paul McCarthy's recent work inspired by Disneyland- drawings and sculptures. I am feeling viscerally aware and fuelled. Highly lucrative overwhelming desire to be overtly messy and slightly vulnerable, physically fragile, mentally edged emotionally up against and into a wall of art, exposed, wide angled-opened and violated by Sparkle-Pink-Happiness of the Disney- sprinkled Cartoon Sugar-Load. I am there. Can I play now?

Can I be disgusting, can I not clean for weeks? Can I live as an over- educated, artistically professionally inclined, coffee-snob-addict-soon to be unemployed, once again, pretty piggy-pig? Please? Can I eat whatever comes to mind, whatever I can afford and whatever I , please, want? Can I stay in bed all day in my flannel faded pyjamas? Can I live like this? Please? I declare my bed a studio and get out of it, reluctant.

Perhaps, it all makes absolutely no difference. Stressed, angry, ill and overwhelmed madly, welcomed back to the Happiest Place ON Earth, Art School . Hooray!!!

forty six: sultry layers of dust/Status Updates

Katya Grokhovsky, Status Updates, 2010/11

Strong feelings were meaningless. Tender Californian sun glowed, catching her by surprise. The light, the awkward light. Uninterrupted Space. She lowered herself into the ocean of limitless procrastination. Regardless, she will conquer this vacuum. For what? Are you Happy dear?

*Happy: feeling light.

Sipping her latte at Intelligentsia, she inhaled deeply. How are you doing? Has anyone asked?
Waxing lyrical about the artist's fate. How she wished for Paris, 19th century. The poverty, the parties, absinthe, early tragic death, prostitution and immortal genius, of course.

*Massive Headache: drinking lots of water and daydreaming endlessly.

Stand on your head. A year, another year, another year.

*Traveled to Los Angeles and back to Chicago. Tired and pensive. Hibernating.

Painting with words. Do you remember when you wrote about the sea? The black sea?

As you mixed your watercolors so technically well, imagining unclaimed lands and territories...romantic heart of darkness.

The folds of her vintage eight dollar cotton dress covered her fuller figure well. Black tights, black boots.

*Buying vintage clothes. Spent forty dollars. Bought: two sweater dresses, one black sweater, two velvet bolero vintage jackets.

The dusty slightly mauve sky promised little. The rain hasn't stopped, perhaps it will snow soon. The red brick houses, Velvet trench coat.

*I have nothing to say today.
*Watching Mad Men. All seasons.
*Anxious. Re-working my CV.
*Obsessively expanding my horizons today.
*Reading book : Power, follow up to The Secret.
*Self-not-helping by sleeping all day long.
*Pushing the envelope of daytime laziness.
*Deciding to begin.
*Not cleaning my bedroom.
*Cooking basmatti rice. Broccoli and garlic stirfry with soy sauce. Dinner.
*Apple cider. Organic. Two spoons in a glass of water. Every morning.
*Unbearable incurable net-surfing.
*The edge of reason: work on it.
*Multi-vitamin. One a day with a meal. For women.

*In the dead of winter: sun shines in My Book.
*Not consistent: Julie and Julia, Eyes wide shut, Whatever works, White nights, Flash Dance, Shall we Dance, Dirty Dancing, Becoming Jane, Dorothy Parker and the vicious circle. Laurie Anderson at Harris Theatre in Chicago.

*Hypnotized and floating.
*Is one more important than the other? - Random phrase, random book on my bedroom floor.
*Be Loyal to both: phrase from an ad, glossy magazine on my floor.
*A second chance for every skin. Vogue.
*Chop. Chop.
*Waking up to my heart beating extremely fast.
*Nothing to report. I am cold.Hot coffee and toast with honey. 4pm Breakfast.

forty five: pause - ahead:

Katya Grokhovsky, video still, senseless, 2008

So let me PAUSE, right here.

Saving......

I have decided not to dwell on the Best off 2010.

It has all been, THE Best.

I take the packaged year, all of it neatly wrapped up into the softest layers of the tulles of memories: still fresh and burning, the subtle, smoky colors of unseen, wished for romantic sunsets and anxious deadline-induced sleepless nights, covered in the new knowledge of unknown, yet confident, tomorrowness, I put it gently away into the pocket of my Experience . Right now, Yesterday. The blonde wigs, the dancing till dawn, the whiskeys on the rocks, the frustrations and joys, the failures and successes, the slow dancing in the lobby of Palmer House Hilton, the dresses, the American Flag, the Ukrainian dancing as a boy, the travels, physical and metaphorical, hours of crap TV to numb the over-active mind, the endless reading lists to last lifetimes, the heated debates, the arguments, the nervous smoking, the stress and yes, new hairs, devoid of color. grey. I kiss.

And so, as of NOW, I have 3 months left of GRAduate School and this blog. Forgive the sentimentality and tears, held back behind this screen, for the Tears, they will be streaming. Oh, come theeeeee, Come oh, May.

There will be, of course, amazingnessss in Future, for MISS Future is a Queen, always, ever shiny, sparkling and shimmering in the oh-so bright distance. I believe. For MAster, Master, I am the MAster, I can do.....

What awaits? As any Graduate Student worth her/his salt, I have no clue. MAster plan?

Yes, many in the stew. Yet. I rest . I pause. Processing the ingredients.........

Trusting my own gut instinct, throughout most of this time, I currently take pleasure in the fact that I am now, in the MFA club. What the hell does it mean? Stakes are raised and they are high and some of us are perched onto them. Money spent, knowledge earned, dark competitive bruises and post-critique scars aquired and healed. Graduate Family. For my life.

As I arrive in Chicago O'Hare Airport from LA, at midnight, one cold weekday, last week, I am greeted by a good looking: " what's up baby, welcome to Chi", I whisper " home..." and smile shyly back, answering I am excellent!!!!

Shall we make some ART?

Let me come out of it and as I stand , ambitiously creatively naked in front of you I proudly SAY this:

I love ART.

For what it's worth.

ok, melting my own icy heart with the melodies of listened- to- in- the- name- of- research of hundreds of slow songs , I ALSO say, in the words of those we know well,

LOVE> is ALL you Need

r.i.p 2010

forty four: Welcome- 2011- Yes We Can

Katya Grokhovsky, Artist Journals, 2008/9


The breadth, the breath of the human stuffy warmth,
stretching lovingly beyond your own means
laying out the large, roughly scratched, leathery hands
hot to the touch they sway and lower you to the ground
up again

pushing tight, cursing roughly, imagining:
eating dirt, consuming spirits, wanting more: being so much less
spotting pretty hard, agonizing over the details of the damned table setting
forwarding painfully aware memories

many more unreliable wishes:
to be adored: to love
to start and manage

RIP 2010

pastel lavender desire, frosting on your cupcakes
I am wishing hopelessly
wondering
orange cat
lazy winter LA sun
pink flannel

nothing beats you
blood or rain

fast winds of thought
accumulating into whirling pools beside your feet
free falling and acrobatic challenges in my head
heart in first and foremost later
don't you forget this
I am your true only one: blue and borrowed
forgiving now and escaping,
the universe tells you to jump off the bridge:
glad to help you

hmm..
what
testing and preparing for flying
skimp up stream

flow

gather strength
shoot the loads

homage to dead women
I form into a puddle of rubbery texture
when I'm dead , I'll meet you inside the sticky cherry jam darkness, homemade

Pina Bausch
Frida Kahlo
Artemisia Gentileschi
Louise Bourgeois
Eva Hesse
Marilyn Monroe
Iris Murdoch
Virginia Woolf
Sylvia Plath
Emily Dickinson
Audrey Hepburn
Georgia O'Keefe
Hannah Hoch
Meret Oppenheim
Chanel
Catherine the Great
Camille Claudel
Jane Austen
George Sand
Edith Piaf
Madame Vionnet
Isadora Duncan
Bronte Sisters
Anna Akhmatova
Natalya Goncharova

Black prune waves, emerald green velvet traps, pomegranate wine, sucked in
plums and peaches, that was quite a traumatic reading of your palm
plus size models, marching on your street today
meaty, fleshed out, volume up, voluptuous growth: trembling
softening your resolve
squeezing, fuming, grazing: greetings
smashing cliches, fluffing egos,
creeps and line up your freaks

fake lawns and butterflies: badly made ideas floating in your wine glass

she looked around and imagined softer light. this room needs orange curtains and a vase. yes, a vase, the vase has to be green. perhaps bright green, perhaps even neon green. perhaps grass color. perhaps even a bottle. those poor flowers need to be in a green vase, in fresh water, on that table, near the entrance to the dining room. she suddenly got up from her favorite yellow faded velvet armchair and walked out of the door. lifted her skirt up. she quickly bent down and looked at her crotch. well definitely no underwear. she had no underwear on. she looked up. just neatly arranged well manicured houses in front of her. she kept holding her dress up. her white cotton skirt had blue polka dots splattered on it. her neck was covered in bed bugs' bites. she kept smiling. Los Angeles.

welcome
ornamental pursuit of excitement and anguish: salutation and disease.
I don't want you.
I just didn't think I wanted you.
perhaps I do want you one day, one day perhaps I will
Perhaps I should give you up:
I am brutally honest.
Meat.
describe: bloody raw. meat between your teeth. rotting , vicious flesh.

what the hell is love.
perhaps: unreliable and messy.
unaccomplished and real.
vile. for the sake of the mess.
undying and scrutinizing you: every inch of you

there is a pimple there is a freckle there is a nail sparkling dust in your stupid fake Disney sky
And so That was the Year
The tough skin became scales
green blue
the lovers, aside, pushed away

achievements

2011.
ready. set. welcome: