Brown Library - hey I want those books back!

Last night I went to Brown's Rockefeller library for the first time because I needed some images of Newfoundland, so I ended up in the section of Canadian history on level 3. It was fascinating! It was sad! There were about 20 or so books on the history of BC, and many of them were from the 1890s. They were so old, when I opened them up, red dust from the jacket was left on my pants as they were disintegrating.


And most of these books haven't been checked out since the 1960s! I guess they got most of their history books on Canada in the 19th century and haven't felt the need to add much to their collection.

There was this beautiful book on the Rocky Mountains, with photos from the 1890s of the mountains and this one of the Banff Springs Hotel: If you open them to enlarge them, you can see the dust on my pants from the books disintegrating.



I seriously felt the urge to steal these books, to bring them to Canada, to repatriate them to the proper archives where somebody would give a damn about them, because obviously if they haven't been checked out in close to 50 years, they're not being used much. It made me wonder what other books about histories were languishing in other Ivy League schools, and who knows where else? It would be a cool project to somehow copy these books so that their information could be in Canadian archives.

The book on the history of BC told of how the First Nations could not cope with contact with a superior civilization (the whites) and intellect, and so they just turned to alcohol and started to die out! This book needs to be in BC archives!

I found this book on Newfoundland written in (if I can remember correctly) the 1930s by Joey Smallwood. The caption under these fish is "a good day's work".


The Canadian history section:

what I see when I walk home - it's usually at night

Okay, before I leave I wanted to show what it looks like when I walk around here, so I can remember too! I usually walk home around anywhere from 10pm to 2am. Today in the Brown Herald I heard there was a mugging at gunpoint near where I live at 1:31am a few nights ago! So it's not all american flags and pillars around here, it's serious business. I love the exercise of walking home, but that freaks me out!

I have to walk through the Brown campus on my way home, and this is my favourite part, it feels so cozy to me, and classic Ivy League campus:



And then I walk another 15 minutes past the Brown campus. I like to walk down Power St. (the street I live on) because it has a lot of houses I feel I can run to in case of emergency, as opposed to dorms, or campus buildings that I can't get into or large brick-fenced lots full of empty blackness. These are some of the houses along Power:




This is the house on the corner on my block. It is somewhat spooky, and felt much spookier when no one was living in it a while back. For some reason, all houses of this style feel spooky to me:



And that's it, a bit of a walk through my neighbourhood (at around 10pm last night).

aahhh, thanksgiving

Okay, even though I was a non-believer of this thanksgiving, I was giving thanks for having no classes for the past week and a bit! I was thankful because even though I was a non-believer, somehow the holidays just seemed to sweep over me, too, and I got all into holiday-mode! So what did I do? Marathon coffee sessions with myself and my sketchbook, I went for a walk with Shannon from Nova Scotia, and I partook in RISD's free turkey dinner for all of us who were left behind and didn't get to go home for thanksgiving.


It was so warm, we ate outside and I only wore a shirt! I ate two pieces of pie, and then they said, please, take some food home, we have too much! So I took home enough helpings for two dinners for myself later, plus much more for my roommate (he works at JCPenny, and says, after taxes, he makes about $6 per hour!), but I did eat one of his pieces of pie - so that made three pieces in total that day for me. And my pants are tight now! But I was pms-ing so I have since excused myself - but not totally.

And before the school shut down on Wednesday, I spent a few hours in the library's little video viewing room. They have these comfy bean bag chairs (actually, not too comfy on the neck) and I smuggled some food into that room and THOROUGHLY enjoyed myself watching Manhatten by Wood Allen and Blood Simple by the Coen Brothers (Fargo fame - they have a new movie, great reviews, can't wait!).



While I was watching the movies I fell asleep for about an hour or so, after a long week of late nights in the painting studio.

Because I have no tv or dvd player at home, and no computer at home, any time I can watch moving pictures is thoroughly enjoyable! This is the first time I've allowed myself to watch some movies at the library here, even though I do it practically every lunch time when I'm at ECI, watch bits of movies while I eat my lunch.

So I was thankful for the holiday, because this week I've been getting some much-needed sleep!

Oh, also, the previous weekend, I went with 3 friends to Vermont, and I was soo tired, I didn't even take photos, except for this one in the rest stop on the interstate as we were leaving Vermont, it was only about 6pm and so dark!


And then, just before I was going to bring the rental car back to Budget - a flipping fender-bender! It was my fault, I was backing out across two lanes, and did not see the guy behind me and I crunched into him! Not too serious, but will probably ending up costing me serious cash!

the big shutdown - aka thanksgiving

The above is an image of some jewelry a fellow exchange student from Sweden made - Marta. She is so talented. She is in the department, Jewelry & Metalsmithing, something they don't offer at Emily Carr.

Anyhow, today is the day before thanksgiving here, and everything is shutting down for at least one day! The worst of which - my favourite coffee shop - the Coffee Exchange!
What the heck?!!

I never thought I'd say this, but thank goodness for Starbucks! I guess I'll be hunkering down there tomorrow. The school will be closed, and possibly the painting studios, so I'll just be working on my kids' book illustrations.

The Met, risd's main cafeteria is closed until Sunday! Yikes! It is the place where I get at least one meal per day, as I can get a full vegan/vegetarian meal for only $2.95! Sooo, I better scamper over to Whole Foods, and get me some provisions for the long day of closedness. Actually, I just read that the international house at risd will be having a thanksgiving dinner with all the fixings tomorrow, I am so there!

Most of the other exchange students went to New York City, but I wanted to save my trip until school was out, and make it a working week, as I will have in total 1.5 weeks without classes. I thought thanksgiving was not a big deal, but come to think of it, it's my first thanksgiving without my family - and yet, I feel like this isn't even my thanksgiving - I feel like I'm in an odd spot - I feel like a non-believer in a land of believers who is pissed that everything is just shutting down around me. Thanksgiving here is a Big Deal - everyone (for the most part, except some Californians and Idahoans) are going home, which always seemed funny to me observing this from Canada.

Happy Thanksgiving!

risd has pilates

One perk at risd is that it has a gym and exercise rooms under the main cafeteria. So I signed up for pilates classes, ten classes for only $50! There are about six of us exchange students in the class, and about 20 in total.We have class every Tuesday at 7pm for one hour.

I've never done pilates before, but I really like it! It takes a lot of concentration and control, which I like and it gets to the stomach muscles like nothing else I've done, and I always feel more relaxed and refreshed afterwards. Ideally I would like to do it at least three times per week, but this is a good start, the exercises seem to be getting easier, so I think I might be getting stronger in my stomach area. This is something I really wish they could offer at Emily Carr, but the cheap price is because it is subsidized by the students activity fees that are added to their tuition.

They also offer yoga (vinyasa and bikrams), kickboxing, butts and guts, and I think a couple others which I can't recall. I can't say how nice the gym is, because I've never stepped foot inside, but it seems to have a lot of machines (I'm not a big fan of machines)!

what to do with a crazy landlady

I just got off the phone with my landlady. I feel very upset about it. The first thing she said to me was, "take out the garbage, that place is a mess!" this is total b.s. We have no dirty dishes in the sink, my bed is made, the kitchen table is clear, and we clean the house once per week. Yes the garbage is full, but garbage day is tomorrow, what's it her business?

And then she also said, "You lied to me!" She has said this the past four times she has called. She says it because she says I never told her I was only staying for one semester. It is her word against mine, but I distinctly remember telling her. She said I lied because I crossed it out on the lease. I only crossed out something she had written previously on the lease because she re-uses the same lease and there's old writing on it. And then when I try to explain, she says, "I don't want to argue about it!"

She actually came into my room when I wasn't there and searched through my stuff to get a copy of the lease! I told her I don't like her doing this, she said, "Oh, I didn't search through your stuff, it was right on the top of the pile, and you had two leases, you lied to me, you said you gave me the other copy!" This is total b.s.!!! She was supposed to come pick up the lease and didn't come. Shit, I just thought that maybe she took my only copy of the lease, or maybe I did have two, I didn't keep track. I have a feeling she is doing this so that she won't have to give me the security deposit back. She totally spins my head around, I can't take it.

I told her, "I don't like your accusations, I am not a liar." And I said, "My roommate's girlfriend is there 6 nights a week, so I only want to pay 1/3 of utilities." She said, "I can't believe you're complaining, I can't help it if his girlfriend is there. You have the whole place to yourself, and you're complaining? I can't believe it!" I don't have the whole place to myself, I use my room the kitchen and the bathroom and that's it. There is a suite empty downstairs, and two empty bedrooms upstairs. I can't help it if her rooms are empty!!! And then, she actually had the nerve to end the phone call by saying, "take care".

Oh man, I cannot take this much longer. It is people like this, and the accumulation of poor treatment, that is making me want to get the hell out of here. Small things like my painting studio neighbour not acknowledging me when I say hello, and other small rude behaviours by other people is turning me off!

These photos are from Halloween, but the eyes in the windows in the photo seem to represent my landlady well.


I guess I shouldn't complain too much, other people have been very kind, such as the instructors in my illustration class, and the students, too, in that class, a couple people in my painting class, and the british exchange students have been great to hang out with, but today, I'm sad/infuriated/frustrated/t.o.'d!

painting critiques - yikes!

Here is a photo of my painting class watching slides in the critique room. The slide is of Damien Hirst's diamond encrusted skull. My painting critique classes freak me out, to be honest, they're pretty harsh compared to what I've been used to.

Here is one of my latest paintings from our last critique. I did it over two days. It's supposed to be a painting that has no conclusion, that goes no where, that was my intention. Also, I wanted to incorporate drawn figures into the painting, and just fill them in. Some of the comments from the critique about my paintings were:


A student: "I wish you would take a stand on something, anything! You just take what's cool and put it in your painting."

My teacher said I should stop looking at contemporary art magazines and look at older paintings. She also said I am very detached from my images, and not to go to the Picture Library anymore, We are not image collectors! Um, what else, oh yeah, she said I was giving them "just enough". Other students came to my defense, "I disagree", said my studio neighbour, "it's a painting that has no conclusion" other people liked some of the elements of the painting, like how I sculpted the faces, and how I painted the shirt on the guy on the right. I was really confused, because as I was making the painting I really liked it, and so felt quite unconfident about my painting choices after this. Also, I was a little freaked out while doing my last three paintings because I had to do them in something like four days, after being sick, and after my first attempt at a painting did not work out. So, now I can see, that yes, I was doing, "just enough". But I do like how I painted the horse and the waterfall pictures in the painting. I seriously hate how I've painted the guy on the left, plus other things about it, too. Oh well, I'm here to learn.

In the last couple days, I've been thinking, "wtf - it's only paint on a canvas, I'm not going to be so serious." And I'm also taking more time to do my next three paintings - 1 per week - quite the pace! I've already painted over the painting I've shown above.

New York + Jenn Jackson + Brooklyn + off-broadway= last saturday

Last Saturday I took the risd bus on down to New York. It was for the day, but when you add in two 4 hour trips to get there and back, I was only left with 6 hours. So many plans had to be fit into 6 hours, and some were discarded! I was very hungry when I arrived, so I came across a little hole in the wall joint, and sat at the counter (that's all the seating there was) and thoroughly enjoyed listening to the New York banter between customers and the owner/cook, Johnny. "Hey John, how are you?" John: "Hey bro, what can I get for you," followed by fist-touch-hand-greetings. It was amazing to me to see how Johnny the cook put his whole body into making a sandwich, it was all happening right there in front of me, and I really appreciated my sandwich after I saw how much effort he put into it.


My first plan was to some theatre. So everyday I've been reading the New York times Arts sections and their reviews of plays. I came upon one that got excellent reviews, called "Speech and Debate". It is at a theatre that is a Broadway theatre I suppose, but downstairs is called the Roundabout Underground, and they are putting on plays by young playwrights, and the tickets are only $20. The playwright of Speech and Debate is only 26, and I learned that he went to Brown University, which is right beside RISD.

When I went to buy my ticket, I found out that the show was sold out for the rest of its run, unfortunately. But they said to come back 30 minutes before the show and there might be some cancellation tickets. So when I came back, they announced that there were only two cancellation tickets, but there were three people in front of me. Fortunately, the three were a group and they didn't want to split up, so I got the ticket, and same with the guy behind me (a dream boat of a man, really, whom I sat beside). The play was very funny, not completely moving or enlightening, which I love in a play, but very entertaining and well done. Here is the one photo I took, the stage is meant to look like a classroom. There was one very large dude in front of me who I always had to crane my neck to look around:



After the play, which was around 2 hours long, I was off to Brooklyn to see The Miss Jenn Jackson! It was sooo great to see her! It turns out that we are both having some tough times with some very critical teachers, and have both wanted to stop doing art all together, so it was great to connect and I felt like I wasn't so alone in this feeling.


As you can see, I was very excited, ha!


Unfortunately I had just over one hour to spend in Brooklyn with Jenn. We grabbed a pizza, went into some great shops and then went to a coffee shop. Brooklyn is amazing. I guess it's becoming known for being the place where all the hipsters live, and when I was looking around, everyone had the art school hipster look.


But it was all too short, and I had to get on the subway to head back downtown to catch the risd bus. I headed in the wrong direction and was 40 minutes late and everyone was waiting for me. Yikes! But at least I heard this duo in the subway, the guy had the most haunting of voices.

risd's nature lab

One of the coolest things that risd has is the nature lab. It is full of taxidermy!




It has little blowfish that are dried up!


It has live chameleons, fish, turtles, rat-like creatures & crickets, and these frogs:


The nature lab started many years back, I think around the 1930s by a teacher, Edna Lawrence, so it is officially called the Edna Lawrence Nature Lab. She started to collect things from nature for her students to draw, and then it just kept on growing.

One great thing is that any item in the nature lab without a red dotted sticker can be taken out of the nature lab for a week! But none of the taxidermy heads can be taken out, but things like shells and pine cones and some butterflies in little clear boxes.


It's an excellent place to come and draw. When I had to make a character from an animal, I first drew the stuffed bear in the nature lab. It's really good to draw something that isn't two dimensional, off the internet or from a book, it's just easier to get a sense of the animal's certain characteristics, like how their paws bend and such.

It's the job of a few students to work in the nature lab, it seems to me like they always have around three students working at one time, as well as a manager or two. I think it would be a great student job, feeding the fish, bringing down the taxidermy when requested, etc. There are also several fake skeletons in the nature lab, and one real skeleton. There are skulls of various different animals and fetuses also. I think a lot of Foundation students come here to draw, I think it would be a great resource when just learning to draw.

This deer sits by the iguana who is kept warm by the red light.