Day 6

Oddly enough, I didn't take any photos today. I can offer you no explanation why. 

Critiques of the visible/invisible projects began today in Contemporary Seminar. For those of you just tuning in, this was the reason i decided to stop speaking for a week, now 6 days ago-- and today, for the first time, I got to see how other people interpreted this concept. Everyone produced some beautiful results, and I couldn't help but notice that they created really great work and still continued to talk. 

Class ended. Furious dash of writing and rewriting a paragraph outlining the dreaded presentation for Art History. Jessi-the-Super-Friend scanned and uploaded some readings for me. I drank three huge cups of coffee and burped a lot (burping doesn't count as speaking). With Jessi and Emily, I went to my three hour evening Art History seminar, which is entirely discussion based, and did not once break my pact. During a discussion about Paul Pfeiffer, however, I did write the following:

I wonder if its about these dichotomies that give the work its poignancy. This scene is played out in an arena where the stakes have been significantly raised. Certainly this is someone who 'may have just one a million dollars,' to quote Paul Pfeiffer. 

Does anyone else fins this piece intensely depressing?

It is disturbing. I don't know the name of this phenomenon, but it happens when you see something you instantly recognize as truth. I feel like this piece point to a truth of our culture that represents almost no progression from throwing Christians to lions. Sure we don't kill them, and we certainly pay them extremely well, however this work makes alarmingly clear (with very few elements) that we as consumers need to visually engage in people falling into roles, and setting up a system in which individuals aspire to be nothing more than fulfillment of spectacle.

It's sad :(

Even without speaking, I sound like such a god damn know-it-all.

I also mysteriously drew a kitten. Again, I can offer no explanation.  

During break, I had an extended conversation (if you could call it that) with Stuart, during which he spoke about matadors, stadia, spectacle and Hemingway. I listened, sincerely interested (I like Stuart), while he talked. he then concluded, in my presence that he "could get used to this kind of conversation." And that he actually loved the sound of his voice. 

I smiled and nodded. 

Afterwards, I wrote short note to Jessi. 

Pizza?

Which spoken aloud, probably would have sounded more like this:

"PIZZA?!"

She invited me over to her house, where we dined on Creole Shrimp, watched Kim and Chris make peanut butter, and I typed to her on her laptop while she sat next to me on the couch. After a couple hours, of this, I got up to go back to the studio, and she surprised me by saying, "Thank you so much for coming over. It's good to hang out with you, even when you're not talking."

One more day. Then I get my life back.