I have to share this.  Number forty nine one of my favorites. What a genius idea!

50 People You Wish You Knew

More Bear Homes

The women's upstairs bathroom in Art building:

The men's upstairs bathroom in Art building:

Project Part 1- Kansas :-)

I carved these little bears while I was in Kansas.  I didn't carve as many as I wanted to so I'm going to keep carving them.  I have most of them with me still.  I left two in Kansas.  I am thinking now about other places I can put them to get different people to interact with them.

I left this one in front of someone's house

 I am thinking now about other places I can put them to get different people to interact with them.

I Want It All!

So next week I am going to Kansas for thanksgiving break.  I am excited to see by brother and his wife and children, and I am really really really excited to see my boyfriend! It is a great coincidence that his family lives in Kansas City as well.  I think that this trip will be a good opportunity to do something with my final project. I have often joked around with my family (usually at the expense of my brother's wife who was born in Topeka and has lived in Kansas her whole life) about Kansas' lack of beautiful natural things.  We complain that there are no big trees, no valleys, no mountains, and therefore no mountain animals.  I would like to poke fun at this and at the same time offer a gift to Kansas to make up for it a little bit.  So for next week I'm carving mountain animals (most likely bears).  I'm going to bring them to Kansas and leave them in different locations at different public bathrooms so that different people might see them.  I am also considering maybe putting them in people's mailboxes.  I think it's an interesting thing- when you go to a gallery you know that it is a common space and everyone feels equally uncomfortable (or comfortable depending on how you look at it).  But say you put all the gallery paintings in a random person's house and then had everyone come over to their house for the show.  They would feel extremely uncomfortable because it's interfering with their personal space.  It also seems really forceful, intrusive, and direct.  I like that it would be direct and I know for sure that people have to interact with the sculptures in some way.  Maybe they will last a couple minutes until they get thrown away, who knows.  Of course you know that there are many different mountain animals in Kansas that are just as real as my soap carvings (which is not real at all), if you take into account stuffed animals and the like. So I am not giving them anything they do not have in that sense.  But how many people in Kansas, or anywhere for that matter, are going to wake up next week, go check their mail, and find a little bear carving interacting politely with their mail?  I am unable to answer that question as I cannot predict the future.  But I can guarantee that at least a few select people in Olathe, Kansas will!!!  Boo ya.

I'll photograph anything I do.

I like this song a lot.  It makes me feel hopeful for the future, on the edge, and weirdly infinite.

The Flies- Bitter Moon

Unknowns and Freedom

I can't stop thinking about travelling lately.  I watched this documentary about a guy who traveled around for a month just using craigslist.  It makes me feel extremely nostalgic, and regretful that I didn't have a camera guy following me around when I was a wanderer.  It was a great documentary and I am so glad that this guy had the courage to leave everything behind and go be a wanderer.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1486616/

I want to do that again so badly!!! I loved meeting new people everyday and sleeping in a new place every night.  I remember sleeping on a night bus to Istanbul, sleeping on a night ferry to Crete another night (just on the floor in front of some seats, sleeping on a bench the first night in Barcelona cause I got in really late and had no where to stay, and one night in Rome I just slept on the sidewalk by a warm-ish vent.  I was so grateful when I actually got to sleep on a bed, have access to a bathroom, really just to be sleeping indoors was a win!  I felt so lucky when someone would give me food too.  I feel like feeding someone and giving them a place to stay is one of the most noble, kindest things a person can do.  I am still in contact with a lot of the people I stayed with and I hope to see them again someday.  I love all the unknowns and the freedom.

I have been thinking about travelling, grad school, and what I'm going to do after graduation a lot in the past month or so.  So much so that it's distracting me hard core from the things I have to do right now.  It has been difficult for me to stay focused for sure.  I think all the time about next year, and I am distracted a lot by how much I miss my boyfriend.  It is best for me to stay busy so I started working 25 ish hours a week.  But that is way too much for me to be working and now I'm excited for next semester when I will not schedule myself for so many hours.  I have been dealing with jobs a lot this semester too.  I had multiple interviews for being an orientation counselor next summer and right now I'm waiting to here back from them.  I had an interview just today for a new job as a rec supervisor for next semester. I am not happy anymore at the Children's Center and I don't want to just stick it out until I graduate.  I am still happy at Challenge though, so I will keep that job.

None of this has anything to do with art (sorry!).  These are the things I am thinking about non stop now everyday.

Awesome Starling Video!

The birds remind me of a giant school of fish. They both have the same maneuvers and group-think. I think it's really lovely.  Also, nearly every Discovery clip is super cool to me. If I ever have cable someday, maybe i'll get the Discovery Channel.  Or work for them someday...

http://www.bing.com/videos/watch/video/falcon-feeding-frenzy/pdqm5e7?q=Animal+Planet&rel=msn&from=en-us_msnhp&form=msnrll

Colors colors...

Concerning organizing my room into colors:

I organized my closet and my possessions by color for many years throughout middle school and high school.  This was not to be artistic, it was one of my many ocd tendencies.  Doing this again now under my own free will feels strange.  It was difficult for me the first time around to let go and let things just be, and as my room is currently in the state that it was for many stressful years, I can't help but remember all that stress.  I remember it, but I do not feel it now, which is a good thing I suppose.  Now I can focus more on the spacial relations and implications brought up rather than the need to have everything be straight, as well as color coded.

I am thinking about a specific part of Joseph Albers' book Interaction of Color. He writes, "As it is with people in our daily life, so it is with color."  He goes on to say, "Therefore, we try to recognize our preferences and our aversions -- what colors dominate in our work; what colors, on the other hand, are rejected, disliked, or of no appeal.  Usually a special effort in using disliked colors ends with our falling in love with them."

I definitely have a bias towards the color blue.  It has always been my favorite color because my dad and I are the only ones in my family with blue eyes (the other three having green, brown, or hazel eyes), and it always made me feel special and connected to him because of that. I noticed that of the things I own that I purchased (things which came in multiple color options), the majority are blue.  I know the color blue is tied into feelings of calmness and serenity.  Maybe this is why I have purchased almost only blue things when I have a choice.  I bought my dresser from walmart and it is blue. I remember it came in different colors, but I don't remember considering other colors or deciding on blue.  Organizing all my stuff by color has brought it to my realization that I have a subconscious bias towards blue and it has influenced me more strongly than I would have thought.  My dresser, my blankets, the Greek flag on my wall, my towel hanging on my chair, my yoga mat lying on my floor, the tie-dye sarong hanging on the wall above my bed- they are all blue! I think this is weird now that I am thinking about it so much.  Perhaps the color blue reminds me of my family and so that is why I like it so much? I am not too sure.  Maybe it's as simply as, it's just my favorite color and that's all there is to it. I really don't know.

Hubble pictures

These pictures really blow my mind! I was thinking today about the evolution of painting after the invention of the camera. And how now, some painters are so realistic that their pieces look like photographs, and some photographers try to be "painterly." These photos look very painterly to me, although I'm not sure if I could give a definition of what that means exactly. I love the colors and the overwhelming sense of mystery.  I imagine these leave almost everyone in awe after they see them for the first time.

http://hubblesite.org/gallery/album/show/nebula/

My Geocaching "adventure"

Yesterday I went on four geocaching hunts.  Unfortunately I was consistently unsuccessful at every spot.  I don't know when everyone on the planet got an iPhone.  Am I the only one who doesn't care about apps?  I know not everyone has an iPhone, but sometimes it feels that way to me.  Well, I still have my brick of a flip phone and unless some stranger off the street offers to buy one for me, I have no intention of getting an iPhone.  So doing this geocaching challenge was, well, challenging.  It was challenging mentally, and emotionally.  To find the locations I joined the geocaching website so I was able to see the coordinates of the caches.  I found a website that allowed me to type in the coordinates and would then show me a dot on a map of pullman.  I drew my own little makeshifts maps as best I could and replicated the location of the dot.  I was not too worried because it seemed like these things would not be buried beneath the ground.  Maybe they actually were.

I was able to do this in the first place just because my mom decided to come visit me for the day.  I don't have a car or anything so it was nice that she came with me to do it and let me use her car.  The first spot was at a SEL sign on Terreview.  I really thought it was going to be right by the sign, but there was nothing but bark.  I walked under the scratchy branches and through the bushes, but I didn't see anything noteworthy and decided to give up after ten minutes of looking rather than drive myself crazy searching for something that might not even be there. 

The second spot was at the intersection of Terreview and Grand.  The map online showed that it was on a trail right off the road.  There was a trail there, and again I walked around looking behind everything and under everything, but I didn't see anything.  My mom was giving her input and I know she was just trying to help but she was confused about how the whole geocaching thing was supposed to work.   She kept asking me what exactly we were looking for, where it was, isn't it supposed to be here?  So as my frustration grew, hers did too and the "adventure" started to feel more like a sentence.  I tried to stay positive, but because it was hot and tiring, my mom was having less and less fun.  

The third location was Terreview Park.  There was a gazebo right where the dot was on my map so I was confident that I would find something at last.  Again, I was left itemless.  I walked around the whole park basically, looking under bushes and I even looked all over, and under, the playground equipment.  I did see the birdie for badminton and a wiffle ball in the bushes. So that was pretty exciting.  The best part was that there was a large family there playing on the big toys, flying kites, and hanging out in the gazebo.  They were watching me the entire time I was snooping around, and their glares let me know that my creeperness was not welcome.  I definitely felt like I did not belong there at that moment.  Nobody asked me what I was doing (for all they knew I could have been looking for a lost diamond ring).  The kites were really lovely to see against the blue sky, I'm glad I got to see that.  Now I am thinking about kites more, maybe I'll paint one.  Or I'll do a painting of something else but inspired by a kite. Hmmm...

So the last spot was at Military Hill Park.  At this point, I had got my mom a large ice tea and I parked the car under the shade so she could wait peacefully in the car and cool off while I went searching.  I walked around for about fifteen minutes, kind of mentally gave up, and sat down in the shade and called my boyfriend to say hi.  I had a nice conversation with him about both of our mothers' capacities to stay calm in uncomfortable situations, and then I walked back to the car and woke up my mom from her nap.  

I enjoyed getting to see parts of Pullman that I had never seen before.  I had never been to Terreview Park or Military Hill Park.  Even though my mom and I were kind of arguing the whole time, it was nice that she wanted to come with me to try it out.  She said that some of her friends had done it before and I could tell before we had even started that she was already eager to tell them about it.  So because I don't have an iPhone or a gps, I basically just got as close to the spot on my "replica" map as I could and i just kind of aimlessly walked around.  I had never heard of geocaching before this, and I still have no idea what I was looking for. A box of some kind?  Were all the items supposed to be together in a bag or was there no specific container holding them?  I looked up what geocaching was all about and I guess it's just a way for people to go on treasure hunts and feel connected to their community.  I think I would have been more successful if I had a gps.

One thing I did really like:  at the spot on the trail at Terreview and Grand, I was walking around beneath a large pine tree and for a moment I got a sensation and a memory of a place called Turnbull Wildlife Refuge.  It's a refuge that is next to the town I grew up in and my dad would take us there all the time. We'd walk on trails, climb little hills, see cool animals (or just their footprints or poop sometimes), and the smell of pine needles fills the air.  When I was that close to pine needles the smell brought me back to being a little kid and playing in Turnbull. And then I smiled, and I was happy to think about Turnbull again.

Progress Report :-)

Hello!  I have not written for a while because I had nothing to say I suppose.  I am still working on my final project.  I believe they are due on Tuesday , I still have to look it up on the sheet.  I made the fox I planned on making and so far I really like it.  In addition to the fox, I made a dead goose.  My favorite part of the song is when the fox sneaks into the farmer's pen and grabs the goose by neck.  The only bad thing so far:  I made a goose like I saw it in my mind.  I did make it gray, but only because it's a gray goose in the song.  But other than that, I did not create the goose with the intention of making it super realistic.  Today, I looked up a picture of a real gray goose.  They have orange beaks and legs.  I made my goose with a black beak and legs.  Probably because that's how canadian geese look and those are the kind of geese I'm used to seeing.  So I thought it was a bit unfortunate that my gray goose is not really a proper gray goose.  I'm kind of glad I waited till now to look up a picture of what it really looks like.  I feel like what I created is really what my vision was.  Had I looked up a picture of a gray goose before I started, I would have been conflicted as to whether or not I should follow my vision exactly or make it look realistic.  So I have a gray goose with a black beak and black legs.  I suppose it doesn't really matter because the fox and his family are going to eat the goose regardless of what color his beak and legs are.

I have enjoyed this project so much! This is my first time (other than 103) working with fabric.  I find it to be most frustrating and stress-inducing at times, though I like everything about the process.  I love picking out fabrics, sketching the creatures, making up the patterns as I go, having things line up nearly straight on, yet off enough that one can tell it's handmade.  And it's imperfections only add to my love for it because I then see the fox as I see myself: imperfect, yet trying to do its best to help those it loves.

One last note:  I named the fox Aloysha.  This is the name of a character in a book I'm reading called The Brothers Karamosov.  Aloysha is the youngest of three with two older brothers, just like me.  He is quiet, observant, and seems to be the wisest of the three siblings, just like me :-)     I feel I can relate to this character a lot so the name seemed fitting.  I think it's best to not name the goose.  Becoming attached only makes it more difficult emotionally when the time comes to eat it.

Crazy like a Fox...

My mum used to sing me a folk song about a fox when she tucked me in at night.  I really love this song because it brings back a lot of memories and it's funny!

The Fox

The fox went out for a chase one night
prayed to the moon to give him light
for he had many a mile to go that night
before he reached the town-o, town-o, town-o
he had many a mile to go that night
before he reached the town-o


He ran right up to the farmers pen
ducks and the geese were kept therein
he said "A couple of you gonna grease my chin
before I leave this town-o, town-o, town-o
A couple of you gonna grease my chin
before I leave this town-o."

He grabbed the grey goose by the neck
slung the little one over his back
he didn't mind the quack quack quack
and the legs all dangling down-o, down-o, down-o
he didn't mind the quack quack quack
and the legs all dangling down-o.

Old Mother Pitter Patter jumped out of bed
out of the window she popped her head yelling
"John, John the grey goose is gone!
and the fox is on the town-o, town-o, town-o
John, John the grey goose is gone!
and the fox is on the town-o."

John he ran to the top of the hill
blew his horn both loud and shrill
the fox said "I'd better flee with my kill
for he'll soon be on my trail-o, trail-o, trail-o"
the fox said "I'd better flee with my kill
for he'll soon be on my trail-o."

He ran right up to his cozy den
there were his little ones eight nine ten
they said "Daddy won't you please go back again
for it must be a mighty fine town-o, town-o, town-o
Daddy wont you please go back again
for it must be a mighty fine town-o."

The fox and his wife without any strife
cut up the goose with a fork and knife
they'd never had such a supper in their life
and the little ones chewed on the bones-o, bones-o, bones-o
They never had such a supper in their life
and the little ones chewed on the bones-o



I'm gonna go look at fabric tomorrow after classes.  Hopefully I'll find something that is homologous with my vision.

finally....

STUFFED ANIMAL!!!!

humor;
the nature of children;
family;
narrative, epic stories;
happy endings.

I am getting a degree in Fine Arts because I want to learn as much about art, about techniques, styles, and media as possible.  Besides the most obvious reason for this desire (I love art!), I want to study art so someday I can translate it into a book.  It is my ultimate dream to write and illustrate children's books someday.  I will constuct a stuffed animal, or a series of stuffed animals for my final project. 

Questions, Comments, Insults

I have not yet started my final project, though I have come very very close to deciding exactly what I want to do, which makes me feel relieved.  I know I want to do a narrative.  A narrative in its most definitive and literal definition (side note: I realize that to tell a story to my viewer I do not have to literally "tell a story")  I want to produce a series of forms, perhaps 4 or 5 depending on time and my concept.  Each of these forms will represent the same being, just in different phases of an event.  I do want to include an anthropomorphic element to it so next I will need to decide on a figure to be my muse.  If I wanted an animal, it is likely that I would choose a mountain goat (I am very fond of mountain goats).  If I chose a mountain goat, it is also likely that the story told would mirror a story of my own life.  Because I associate myself closely with mountain goats, it would be nearly impossible for me to use them as the avatar for a story about someone or anything else.  So shall I do a story about myself using a mountain goat as my main character?  This is a leading possibility.  I am waiting for something amazing to strike me like it always does when I am stuck as to what to do for a project.  I wait until everything feels right and I know this is what I should do.  I have not felt that yet but I really do like where I am going with this. 

As for the material, I think that it will strongly depend on the story.  However, I already have an idea in my mind that the final goat will be cast in metal.  This is because if the story is about me, it seems fitting that the end result will be something hard, static, and unyielding, yet shiny and welcoming.  For that goat I believe I will first do one in clay, then figure out the process with some help.  What story should I do? 

It was very helpful talking to turk (sp?) last thursday.  She had me write down all my favorite things in life.  What caught her eye was how everything I liked seemed to be threaded together with common themes:  humor, family, narratives, happy endings, epic stories.  This amazed me because I had honestly never consciously acknowledged that before.  But after I thought about it, the more true it became.  Pretty much everything I love in this world has some connection to a member of my family.  Even my possessions, for example, only mean something to me if they were gifts from a given family member.  I guess I am pretty into family, though I had never thought of myself like that.  Coming from a "broken" family with a pretty messed up childhood, I always thought that happy families are just something on tv, but do not exist in reality, not for me at least.  But I guess I have come to terms with my situation after years of hell I now feel like I have a better relationship with either of my parents, and either of my brothers, than many of my friends who come from those tv "happy families" do.  I would like to incorporate this into my project.  A story about my family?  I like that idea. 

The Proposal (sorry no Ryan Reynolds in this version)

I think I want to work more with traditional sculpture.  I really enjoyed working with food and I think it would be fun to work with more types of food.  I don't have any specific conceptual ideas yet, though.  Lately I have been thinking a lot about decisions, paths, the stepping stones of life basically.  One decision leads to another decision, which leads to another, which leads to another.  One of the fundamental beliefs I hold is that good short term decisions will lead you down a path that will ultimately bring you happiness and success.  For example, I don't do drugs, but have had the opportunity to many times.  Each time, I think, "this will not affect the rest of my life.  This one act now will probably have nothing to do with what happens to me or where I'll end up in ten years so I should just do it."  But that is just a thought that crosses my mind momentarily.  I remind myself of the fundamental value I believe in and easily say no.  I have never said, "I will never do drugs," because never doing drugs is not the point.  I don't know who I'm gonna be in five years, I don't even know who I'm gonna be tomorrow.  Nobody does.  All I know is that at that particular moment, doing the drug was not gonna be beneficial to me.  But who knows, maybe someday it will be.  Again, I don't know and nobody else can either.  Getting back to the project, I guess what all of this is about is that I would like to do something exploring the choices people make, life paths, directions, regrets because of action, regrets because of a lack of action, and the idea of an finish line.  Not everything that I believe in, but what I in addition to other people believe in.  For example, I don't believe that happiness is a finish line, I believe it is a lifestyle.  Others might disagree and I would like to explore all perspectives if possible.

I have no idea at the moment what kind of sculpture would embody all of this the best.

Technically speaking, I really enjoyed the wood carving.  I could do a series of small wooden sculptures of a person at different stages of life.  Maybe just shown in different positions representing different stages in life.  Or I could do an animal instead a human and give anthropomorphic element to it. I like that.  It is done a lot, however.  But that's okay. It's not like the peeps at Disney said, "No we can't make a movie about talking lions, we already used the talking animal idea." 

Okay after getting all of these thoughts out I feel better.  I think I will further explore the wooden sculpture idea.  A series of figures would best represent my concept I think.  I'll think about other materials I could use as well.  I could make the figures in clay and then cast them in aluminum or something.  I don't know.  I don't want anything about the sculptures to be arbitrary.

I am excited for class tomorrow.  I would really like to learn how to make casts of the body, hands in particular.

plastic bag stories :-)

The premise of my zip lock bag project:


I was the one with the balloon.  The zip lock bag was actually one my friend gave me for my birthday (at one point in time it was filled with cookies), and it said, "Yay 20 years old!" on it.  Inside the bag were 3 items.  One was a dream catcher earring my dad bought for me from our favorite place on earth, Glacier National Park. Another item was a keychain with a few dog charms on it that my mum bought for me.  And the third item was a piece of a earring I used to wear.  It was a seattle mariners logo, but the needle part broke off so I know I just keep the little trinket.  And my oldest brother gave me those mariners earrings.  I guess you could say the bag represented myself.  Those things inside were representations of not only my favorite things (Glacier, Mariners, my dog, my native american heritage), but also the relationships I have had throughout my life which have shaped me and made me who I am.  And I decide to tie a birthday balloon to it as a means of transportation.  I realize that if I really want to accomplish my goals in life, I cannot stay 19 forever.  The balloon (aka getting older) is a way of taking me to different parts of the worlds and enabling me to experience new things I have never experienced.  Another element to the whole thing was the idea of conceptual balance.  The balloon will not be able to take the plastic bag anywhere if it is too full of heavy things.  Just like I cannot not move forward in life if I am caught up in destructive relationships with others.  Things will go in the bag and out of the bag as it moves around and follows an unpaved "path."

My other bag was a bag full of "garbage," but really they were all things that could be recycled.  There was an aluminum can, some cardboard, and a plastic bag.  On the bag I wrote, "HIDE IT IN HERE NOBODY WILL SEE IT."  I don't really want to say what this means to me, because I think it can mean different things to different people and I don't want to take that meaning away from them.

side note:  I just realized that this bag is sitting on my desk, will probably be discarded of in the next week when I clean my room, and the chance of any human other than me seeing it is pretty much zero.  Yet I still think of it as if something that can, "mean different things to different people."  Funny how these imaginary people exist in my head, yet they still exist enough for me to feel uncomfortable with the idea of taking something away from them.

Back on track: I found it really amusing that it was one of two or three bags that no one spoke of in our critique.  The idea of hiding something, or itself, translated into practice I guess.  But it could have just been a coincidence who knows!

Installation

For my installation project, I decided to work out of my bathroom.  People use this room, come and go, and I feel like it is really under appreciated.  I think many of us do our best thinking in the bathroom and I'm sure a large number of geniuses have had their "breakthrough" while showering, washing their hands, or doing some other necessary physiological activity.  So to show my appreciation for the bathroom, which is usually neglected at every party, I decided to throw it a party in a sense.  I hoped to engage the space that is usually not given a second thought as people did their thing in there.  I pinned up balloons all over the walls and had balloons covering the floor.  To add an extra element, I stuck my stereo system under the sink and had speakers playing Lil' Wayne on the back of the toilet.  I set this up around 4 pm and left there, music playing, till 1 am. 

My roommates' reactions to this were the best part.  One of them heard the music in the bathroom and kept asking me if it was okay to go in there cause she really suspected that there were people in there having a party.  Then she later told me that she looked forward to going to the bathroom.  My other roommate was scared to go in because she was so clueless and fearful about what she might find.  When either of them asked me what was going on in an attempt to find out what was inside the room before they entered themselves, all I would say was, "It's just a little party."

The space actually began to transform gradually.  At one point as I was using the bathroom, I felt a little self-conscious.  The party-ness of the room definitely affected me.

Quote from my roommate's facebook: "...thanks to one of my roommates, a trip to the bathroom is like a party..."

Goofy String

I feel like balloons lately.  I get into these phases where I only want to draw cartoons of wolves or .  And right now I feel drawn to balloons beaucoup.  I love balloons because they are universally happy.  I love making people happy and no other object, excepting money, has the power to put a smile on so many people's faces.

Barry Johnson didn't respond yet.  Hope he still will!

I have really enjoyed this class more and more as I got into it.  I felt very constricted at first, all starting with the clay.  I chose sculpture over ceramics because I really don't enjoy working with clay all that much.  On the first day when we were told we'd need to go buy clay, I felt quite dismayed.  But I am glad now that I chose sculpture because I am learning so much more than just how to do a wax mold (this isn't to dis the importance of wax molds at all).  Now I feel the freedom to do what I want that I could compare to breathing.  It was hard at first because my brain is so wired to look for an A.  Get assignments, do assignments, get grade, move on.  This class is really a release from that and I'm trying really hard to not limit myself by what I "think" you want us to do or what I should do.

Under the Hill

On turning 20:  all of my memories feel the same (memories from when I was 5 do not feel any further away than my memories of when I was 15).  And they all feel like they happened yesterday.

I left a comment on Barry Johnson's blog.  I am anxious to see what he thinks.

Not many...

There's a light over at the Frankenstein's place.  That is all I can think of right now.  I am ready for the critique tomorrow, though not excited.  I cannot remember when the next plastic bag project is due.  Not tomorrow hopefully.  Today was one of those days that make me feel like, what did I do to deserve such a great life.  I found a peace in running around from place to place today.  I looked everywhere I went.  I don't even know what I'm looking for.  I guess I'm just looking for ideas, inspiration, anything I can use for a future project.  But sometimes I find things that I don't think I would ever use for a project, but it's still interesting.  I like training myself to be open like this. 

Bullshit Project

I have not written in a while because I was feeling dismayed about how my last project turned out and I feel little inspiration about which to write.

But things are much better today!

In psychology "gender constancy" is the moment or stage of life when a young child realizes that his/her gender is concrete, permanent and that he/she will remain that gender for the rest of his/her life.  This usually happens around the age of 4.  This idea has been floating around in my head for while now and it is what I would like to do my bullshit project on.  Our culture puts a huge emphasis on gender and it starts at infancy.  Parents (for the most part) dress girls in pink and boys in blue.  We are obsessed with putting males and females in their places from the first breath!  When someone walks up to a parent with a baby, they feel that they should instantly be able to tell whether it is a boy or a girl.  And if they cannot tell, they'll ask the parent.  Is it a boy or a girl?  It is as if they cannot go on with their day without knowing what gender that baby is.  And no, you cannot just accept that it is a baby, a new life, a wonderful creation in itself.  Knowledge of gender is indispensable to some.

This continues heavily though the ages of toddlers and preschool (2-5).  I work at the WSU Children's Center in a preschool room.  There are boys and girls ages 3 and 4.  They are really great to talk to about things like this.  As one would expect, nearly all the girls wear pink on a regular basis (I used the work "nearly" so as to not be absolute though I cannot think of an exception).  I often ask girls and boys about color.  What is your favorite color?  Do you like this particular color, why or why not?  Girls often respond that their favorite color is pink, or they say pink along with other colors they name (i.e. blue, green, yellow, etc.).  Boys never say pink.  Boys say blue, green, red, black, orange.  I enjoy these conversations, though I do not push very hard because I don't want to take advantage of my position by interrogating the children in hopes of gaining some bit of psychological insight.

Sometimes I really want to just yell, What is the big deal about liking pink???  Because that is how I feel.  Not that there is anything wrong with pink.  I love it just as much as every other color in the rainbow.  But I know what they would say.  "Pink is a girl color."  This is what they, and most other people in our society have been conditioned to believe.  From birth, girls wear pink.  How can I expect a 4 year old girl to understand that the only reason she claims pink as her favorite color is because she has been conditioned to?  I don't know that I can.  I feel that children are really missing out when we raise them to believe that this is a boy activity, this is a girl activity, boys: don't play with those dolls, those are for girls only; girls: don't play with those G.I joes, those are for boys.  They are missing out on new experiences, new ways to think about the world, new ways to learn.

This is what my bullshit project will be about.  I would also like to incorporate the double standard of gender roles in my project.  Boys are held in a much tighter box of what is socially acceptable that girls are.  Girls can play with almost any toy they want.  But if a boy plays dress-up and wants to wear a pink dress up then typically he will be discouraged immediately.  It blows my mind that there are parents out there (I really know some first hand) whom I have seen make a 3 year old boy take off a play-dress.  Are they afraid that the dress will turn their son gay?  Wow.  So getting back on track with the project, I want there to be a blue box.  Completely sealed, representing boys.  There will also be a pink sphere-shaped open form representing girls. 

My thoughts, these are.  (said in a Yoda voice)