TWENTY NINE: gestures, power and gender

Invitation to slow dance, 2010, Katya Grokhovsky (dancing with Maya Jeffereis)
photo Andrew Green

Invitation to slow dance , Katya Grokhovsky, 2010 (dancing with Crispin Rosenkranz)
photo Andrew Green

How gendered is slow dance? Am I actually, forgive me, surprised? Possibly? I am. How naive. yes. It is gendered. everything IS. Absolutely is. Maybe perhaps I'm so used to being my own boss , I never re-think my gender until I am of course, rudely reminded. I don't mean on the street or anywhere really, I mean in my own art re-finement and it comes biting me, jolting me. Me. woman. re- a woman. You have ovaries and things and period and things and mood swing and things and breasts and all of it. your body is watery jelly dark unknown, your biology...My biology. Shall we? Dance with my biology? Twirl and spin slower . Slower.

..who's the man...there is no man. let me be the leader- you follow. serenade to me.Rebbecca Horn. extend my body- make it stronger....make it powerful...give me steel..afraid to crumble and die. body landscapes body choreography and gestures....eating lemons pickled juice drinking pickle heaven ...uhhuh...embracing my weakness. Low low lower...paying attention to details...extended eyes...green eyeshadow, foundation. beige softer beige . black dress. I don't wear that. well..stilettos digging into concrete floor. I have strong arms, let me lead you. do you mind? he minds.

He always minds. why do I have to fight you for leadership? I'm a natural born leader or so they say. poor pushy bossy bitch? ahhh don't women have to be be aggressive? aggressively slow dancing I am twirling and being twirled. I am rounding up my thoughts. what if I never fall in love again? what if this it. all I have. this is it. right now. who saw it? who wrote about it? who took notice? who came ? who cares? twirling being twirled. dip me. I'm dipping. dipping. him her. let me teach you, it's easy.

How easy? terribly tired feet now. Stilettos, heavily carrying the burden of my body. testing testing enduring and smiling lovingly. Would you? No. Embarrassed? No. rejected.

Getting up on a chair at 8pm , during my 16th bday party, thanking everyone for coming. I tried to pull all my hair heavy thick hair up into a do. it was falling apart all evening. the dress which never fit me well, cheap black organza, lots of skirts, wide belt and buckle, numerous straps. that doesn't suit you or fit you well. don't slouch. always curving your back. stand up straight. would you dance with him? he's always asking about you. I am always asked about. You know her. yes, I know her. Food overflowing on round tables, pickled tomatoes, my favourite. stop eating them. I can't stop eating them. I eat them. how drunk are you and why do you have two pairs of underwear on? Um, I don't know I feel more protected this way? protected from what? I don't know. I just feel like wearing two pairs when I wear a skirt. that's all. pretty easy to understand I believe. I'm not so sure about that.

Spin slower. Step softly, just shuffle. Do you mind if I lead? I lead naturally, it just happens, that's why I cant find a man, you see.. HA! Apparently. I love to lead, I lead every dance, that is why I can not dance proper couple dance steps, you know, tango, all of it, I just lead and hate being led. In Argentinian tango the woman is just gently supposed to fall into her partner, I can never release the control, the trust is never there. I resist and strongly, it is quite comical actually. maybe there is nothing funny about that, but when it happens, I find myself in hysteria over it. I smell onion breath, did you just eat onions? No well, maybe at lunch I think..well, I can still smell them....step, step, step, step again.

Steps:

1.Find and invite a partner to dance with you. Look into that person’s eyes, when you ask him or her to dance.

2. Escort your partner to the dance floor slowly. Don’t be nervous, there is nothing to worry about.

3. Assume the position, face your partner, standing so that your head is about a foot or two away from his or hers.

4. Begin to move to music together with your partner, as you desire. Traditionally, the man leads, however, there are no rules anymore. Shuffle softly, slowly and smoothly. Follow the beat of the music and the leader.

5. Interact with your partner verbally or via eye contact during the dance.

6. Thank your partner for the dance.

Odessa notes, Katya Grokhovsky, 2008

TWENTY EIGHT: SHALL WE SLOW DANCE

Invitation to slow dance, 2010, Katya Grokhovsky
photo: Andrew Green


Invitation to slow dance, 2010, Katya Grokhovsky
photo: Andrew Green

Invitation to slow dance, 2010, Katya Grokhovsky
Photo: Nicholas Foster

Dance.

Let me come out of the closet and Dance. If I wasn't doing this....I would be? Perhaps...

let's possibly do it. let's try, let's tremble. let's slow slow dance tonight. Would you like to slow dance? Sadness suddenly pinches and tugs annoyingly at my heart of hearts. Holding the soft smile. rejected? would you like to slow dance? No? I won't pressure you. Please? How do you dance this? Follow me. Do you dance with females as well? Will you be the man or will I be the man? Just follow me, there is no man. I will lead you, put your hand in mine. trust me, you will be fine, it's very easy, very. Your hand on my waist, you are a man. I hug your shoulder. do you always lead? Always. The music is kind of terrible.. Is it? It's romantic. yes. It's romantic. Emotional and romantic. Embarrassing? Emotional? I don't feel anything. It's sort of well, cheesy. Cheesy, what an interesting concept. yes. cheesy. You know, when I lived in the Cheesy country of soviet union, I never thought something could be cheesy, the concept dissolved inside the large cheese itself. Now? let me dive into the idea. The distance between us is so small. the distance between us . Faces, skin tone, texture, glasses shimmering, eyes blinking, eyelashes, pores. hello, I'm Jason. You all right. yes, great. My breasts touching the torsos. facing the distance. Tango? let's tango a little. How do you tango? Dramatic gestures, this is a socially awkward situation...Social slow dance. I had no idea you are able to talk during this. No steps? Thank you . Thank you for the dance. this is like, kind of in the end of those movies..yes. movies. not life? No. There is never a slow dance at the end. I have never danced like this before. It's not really a dance, is it? I have no idea what I am actually doing, at all. Is this "my way" in Italian? I think it's in Spanish. Let's dance to it. ...Sorry, I think I stepped on your feet, I'm so sorry. never mind, it's part of it. This is so much fun and it's also kind of hard. yes, it's harder than I thought. Trying to be natural and working at it, working at being natural...Unnatural exhaustion, stilettos. Smile and move on. This is the performance? really? I don't ..oh hang on..I get it. I do, I do. Wonderfully subtle. This might be coming from your heart..oh...oh....yes, perhaps it is. It is.

TWENTY SEVEN: BACK TO SCHOOL SPECIAL///i wanna be loved by you...nobody else but you

Katya Grokhovsky 2010

BACK TO SCHOOL.
SPECIAL?

2nd year MFA.
Who's afraid? ............Puh!...I couldn't aspire to anything higher....i wanna be loved by you...just you....
New bigger studio. Fishbowl, window above my head, I can be watched from the street 2 floors above. Exhibitionist? Down-under in the basement. SHOULD I DANCE FOR YOU? I can see a triangle of a sky. Success. Tiny pleasing miracles in abundance. Attracting energy. BANG BANG. Preparing an action-performance. INVITING TO SLOW DANCE. obsessing over the sentimentally softly glamorous and vintage play list. trying hard, crying lost illusions. languages floating in and out of my headphones and consciousness. It'll happen at the edges and the borders.trusting instinct, loosing sleep, breaking my own awkward moments and movements.Hidden talents? Dance and realistic-renaissance painting ability. ...alone.....

divivverer...vomavere..questa..cosa...elluuuuuni comnera somprandra la cosi...
pue che poui...naon lachara....ALL YOU CAN YOU GOTTA TAKE THIS LIFE AND LIVE IT...NEEEVER ...I UNDERSTAND..OHHHHHOOOGO

seeping gently into my veins mixing inside....dancing..the slow dance playlist enters my center..words sing themselves...just you...nobody else...

you get one chance.....its shadows every memory that....i tell you this because i know...

Fear and loathing: pleasure and truth: be ready. Metal wielding ? Frustrating myself, I am attracted and appalled. No tool language. Basics and I'm nearly crying. Really? Open flame beckons and I submit to endless safety and instruction lecturing. Metal? here we go, sculptor! New leather boots. they hurt my feet. Performance, writing and metal blending into each other in harmony in my meddled head. Let's figure this one out. Shock and blood, guts and wonder. Sweating and swallowing pride and ego. yet...Possibilities and new worlds. My head fills itself up with ideas, which when hitting the wall of reality , fall heavily to the concrete floor of the shop. Ah well. Let's see what we can achieve here, best of all, learn. Trying to stick to this is perhaps futile, but let me try , please, I promise I'll survive the drill and grind, so to speak! Fear full? Yes. Quitting? No. This is a performance anxiety accelerated and submitted to objective thought, what am I to do in the metal class, in the heavy duty beautiful metal shop? Perform miracles. Make something, damn it! NEXT!

MONCIONE TUTT POI DIVIVERA LA PICA PUI VHE PUO pu che puoi

Should I dance for us?

Social history of dance. Ma le ruci, tittera fonte teiento...Italy..I miss youuu..nun merascicio ti peki viento...cominche....Tu pole liesei...tmatanto tonte bella nesai...una c tae normale...syo snat tuitno delesaui....

Heart stings...strings strings voice ..Julio Iglesias...why so emotional?

tu poic bena

I was by myself ...lonely wine..then he walked in..with some woman whose place was once mine..and she wore his ring on her finger...


the band began a song...i saw a man and he danced with his wife...we danced on this floor..his eyes were only on me...where how could i go wrong? all night long...two weeks later...knock on a door...he was back...all those good times before...he kissed me and he told me i left her coz i love you..so much more...than i knew...

i saw a man and he ..now hes dancing with me


i remember before his eyes were only.....

a volte infrantifantasia te nedo tlemaneta soviviaolia supita ete che choriosmoi te vosto viseop jama prses molatil ah volte tvoreeeeeeee...di voy madonna angelic miy cuda lamangia sequanta compania ...novokarcheta vnuknemore ahit diunessimenaychoria...ahit coviltekruorreyh...ai volte kuoreeee...

La La LA jhtjhtb iehhhhhhmmmmmmm..lAlAl lA lalaln jmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmla la lallalaaaaaaaaaaaalallllllllllaaalalalala- - - -hmmmmmm
hmmm
hmmmm
hmmmm
hmmmmmmmmm...-----traaababababbabababa 11111.............tryyyyrimdkmngksngkweht.....hmmmmajjjjammmmhkkklllkkkhmmmgjtt fggrgrksklslslsnfhfhjfjrnrtbrbrbhrhrhrhrhrh........................-----------.....----
dtadtataaaa
fdad dad da
ohhhh che sisate ehe kuvosefei scoraso maoisokundatroooo..feisorhntiro

useioemor
tamericano orheokukivosei foifraquazi asitnuulmatouuuu...

tetisoramait.....


Theories? Music.

Oahiylalllayayyai...dont lebe in me in all this pain..dont leave me out int he rian...vome back bring back the smile...i need ur arms to hold me now..nights r so unkinf..bring back thsoe nights...unbreak my heart.....say u love again me gaian..undot hese tewras hurt when u worked out the door uncry these tears i cried so many nights...unbrerak my heart my heart...my heart....take back that sad word goodbye bring back the joy to my life come and kiss this pain away icant forget the day yu left time is so unkind....and life is so cruel without you here beside me unbreak my heart...say you love me again undot his hurt because you walked out of my life uncry these tears ic ried so many nights unbrerak my heart ....hooooowwwwwwooouuuuu


Puh!
Touching? Dont leave in on this pain dotn leave me out int eh rain bring abck the nights when i held you.,.,unbreak my heart say you love again...uncry undo this hurt you caused when you waclek un brrak oh baby come back and say you love me unbreak me without you i just cant go on say you lobff em v me me love come love me unbreak my heart say you love say you love me say you love me say you love me

Time. 3 hours of sad slow songs and a summer of choosing them and I am not a puddle of mush, yet torn heart strings might tear once more, just a little. cheese? why is something considered cheesy and embarassing? the borders are softly dissolved and I am convinced it matters little.

pampam...palalalal....undrgrizelzhigodeboden....zigofoleolgo...taileo shufeinhn....shguehin....
tatatat....

let me be misunderstood...

if you go away...if you go away...but if you stay ill make you a day like no day has been or will be again

leave me just enough love...to hold in my hand..if you go away..ne me quitte pas!

Dance me through the panic
Touch me with your naked hand
Touch me with your glove
Dance me to the end of love.

reading books about dance.
watching films about dance.
listening to music for the dance.
dancing for hours.

performance friday.
let's dance
shall we dance
cry me a river!
I cried a river over you!

TWENTY SIX: that time of the month//angry artist born woman

Sometimes it hits. Flood of emotions and wasted feelings.

The cold Western stare into my hysterical Eastern tears.

The lonely one night stand with the potential enemy.

as I listen to the soapy sappy lonely sad pathetic play list for my upcoming performance my heart so to speak softly slowly melts and breaks. Why? The absence of all lovers. Perhaps celibacy is the real answer. Anger hunger for recognition of my work is sometimes too powerfully intense. Anxiety overwhelms my heart. PMS or artistic despair?

unable to be lifted. Let me fly. I anger for artists born women and women born artists. God!!! Let us show our work and breath. I am not advocate for women only galleries or movements or shows, but... Do not let the boys win!

Remember when you were little you thought that women could not write ? Or paint or create anything much in the world, yet you knew that was entirely not true? You felt it in your bones, as you were becoming a woman yourself, you knew the world holds a lie, a big lie. They were there.The creators born with a vagina. Always. The first time you went to the library and found out there is a separate section for women artists? How shocked you were by the discovery of it and appalled by the separation? How truly shocking. You never ever thought there was something you couldn't do, and yet, you watch in despair, as millions of women enter and support art schools and millions of their male colleagues "make it" in the world afterwards. it just ain't cool to have a vagina. It just ain't cool. cold, edgy, hardcore, no pain-no gain. .."if you had a dick...the things you could do, baby..." Oh my how I wished to be a boy when I was young, and how I don't now. How I treasure the ambiguous ground of a female territory, whatever it might be, the ability to shape-shift into anything, the sliding fears of intrusion, the intense emotions, the ability to cope, the frustration of no expectations from the outside and from the onset, the building up and the falling down. the bi-sexuality and absence of maternal bone, the heart and
meat, the blood and slimy fluids, the awareness of the stare and gaze, the extreme reality of biology and its constant denial. A package , burden and true love. bring it to the table!

TWENTY FIVE: LAP-TOP-LESS//symphony to Vogue and eye-lust

Katya Grokhovsky, 2010, Summer

End of Summer TA-ship. Last overwhelming critique of final photo projects and I am in teacher mode. Satisfied and head ached, yet what a joy to impart wisdom to younger minds. My Lap-Top has decided to commit half-suicide and I took it, weeping silently, to its parents, Apple. I am waiting and have found myself, in panic-mode. How long has it been, since I did not have a laptop attached to my hip? Dinosaurs were seemingly alive. My phone is no IPhone either and I am left with a strange forgotten electronically dependant nothingness. I have become at my own disposal. Now, I have to drag myself over to school's labs and library to check up on mostly unnecessary emails and to waste some precious summer hours on FB. I admit to this.

However, this has been a curse and a blessing in slightly veiled disguise. I spent Saturday Night Reading. yes. Reading a big fat book by Camille Paglia, Sexual personae - Art and Decadence from Nefertiti to Emily Dickinson. It made me hungry, horny, and absolutely intrigued and wanting More. And there is More. It is a big book, as stated previously. I like big Books and I cannot lie. I do. The end isn't near and the pleasure is prolonged. My book lust has been awakened once again, and I found myself lazily and lustfully wondering over to bookshops. Skimming titles, I buy Absurdistan and Kafka on the shore ...and an over-sized September issue of American Vogue. Ah, pleasure here we go. I'm half down into Absurdistan already. Hungry constantly. Brain craves fuel. But let me caress thee and sing to Vogue.

The satisfaction of new glossy shiny untouched and virgin Vogue has been my life-long forbidden pleasure and spending luxury. I luuuve it. Somehow, I permit myself this particular vice and never-ending Vogues pile up wherever I am, only to be left behind to new loving owners or deposited in parents' garage, in dusty rotting mountains of decaying splendour. Talk about Decadence and its' disease of the eye. Perhaps. yet, as I open and sniff the perfumed pages, here Gucci, here Prada, here Yves Saint Laurent, nothing exists. Only the end will be near, soon enough. The newness of the new, the promise of love? Coming from troubled waters of my fashion background, all this isn't surprising, but its persistence well into my art life is, if a little embarrassing to admit to my artist peers. I buy Vogue. Italian mostly, occasionally American and Australian, sometimes French. I am Vogaholic and I am proud of It. Is there a cure? I'd like to think not. Magazines have long been discussed as objects of desire par excellence in themselves, and that is partly true, of course, but it is what they contain that leaves me with some sort of magically enhanced endorphins, floating about my over-excited blood.

I Vogue- page- shop in my mind. I imagine my glossy sleek heroines as myself, adapted and reshaped, better versions of myself, more glamorous, groomed, aloof, less human, less and more woman, less fragile, less emotional, more sophisticated. I imagine all this, as images flood my imagination, I float on a cloud of mixed perfumed scents and labels. The designer names are whispered in soft French lace and silkiest baby pig leather into my ears. I am almost ready to pray. I lust and hunger and want . How politely incorrect. I'd like to hate this, but I do not.

My taste for decadent disarray and accumulation of beautiful things has always been there, even if I vigorously deny it in cleaning sprees and tornadoes and sometimes very minimal held back mode in my practice. But it is precisely that, just barely holding back the curtain of absolute avalanche of madness and beauty and desire, that I work with and sometime release, sometime strap tight, sometime destroy and start afresh.

TO Vogue, Pleasure and pain of non-attainment.

TWENTY FOUR: displaced young woman//raw

Undergrad Visual journal pages, VCA, Melbourne, Australia, 2006

Last 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

TWENTY THREE: 1 year in Chicago//Reflections

arrival in Chicago, August 2009, parents: Tanya and Ross, photo Katya Grokhovsky

arrival in Chicago, August 2009, photo Katya Grokhovsky

Just a little little nostalgic anniversary of my arrival in Chicago - one year ago, 4th of August, 2009. When the promise of arrival was before me, when the city lights opened a way forward and to my future, when I breathed a dream into my lungs. Beckoning and arising, sun and moon: here we go!!! Oh, how I know this promise, and what a perfect land to land on for the original promise of a Golden Opportunity. Hope it works hope it works, cross your fingers and close your eyes and through your closed eyelids see it, taste it smell it all, believe it...and jump higher than all those bedroom ideas and closeted fears!!! Now knowing, slightly damaged, slightly broken and crooked, now simply tougher skinned and hard metal willed, now breathing steadier, anticipation held even, distributed: now older, now stronger, obnoxious on demand, inspired always, nervous more, ambition cracked open and exposed, talents un-covered and bared nude, bloody and confident, now colder and taller, now standing still, watching closer. Listen: What a year. review. I learned, I cried, I suffered, struggled, created, destroyed, agonized. I lusted and lost and fell in and out. I grew and grew up. I am an eternal student--academic: perhaps through and through. I am lazy and have perfected the art of procrastination to the point of beauty in itself, punishing myself with extreme amount of work load. I fell into photography and love with it. I will never stop writing. I would like to do a PHD. I like America a lot. Chicago became home. I can talk about art forever. I have finally became an artist with a profession of an artist. I don't have as many fears or insecurities about everything and all in general, as I used to. I will be fine. I love teaching art and will teach art always. My art stems from overly simple and yet complicated, cliche, but so true desire to be loved and to help: my own self and others through it. Help how? I do not know, but somehow it is extremely important. It's better than anything. This and nothing else. Yes, help and cure, heal and excite, question and amuse, assume nothing, take a stance, risk it all, raise the stakes, higher!!! To love, yes, to love.

I have overcome fear of public speaking and became good at it. I am capable of living with non-artists. I am difficult to live with, but I give back . Self-tracking became an obsessive feature of life. Simply because I am alive, here and now, born, existing. To be real, perhaps you need to be seen, followed, read, observed, examined? appreciated. To live forever. What if I die? Would you know? Will I live forever as an Internet entity ? Let them know you exist? Never thought I'd want to paint again. I want to paint.

Drawing streaming-consciousness with coffee and collected leftovers of old red wine. I don't like to clean at all but once I do, it's an obsession. I love my apartment. I believe in number 13 or 31. Both are my destiny. New roommates, learning so much from people who have nothing to do with the art world. Learning: there are other worlds, other activities, really? yes, truly.

Movies on DVD:

"They shoot horses, don't they"?
Alice Neel, a documentary
Georgia O'Keeffe, a movie
Edward Scissor hands
Grey Gardens, the movie

Chicago, 2009