How Philly Moves

Exciting events are afoot (pun totally intended) for my photographer friend J.J. Tiziou! His project, How Philly Moves, is about to make an exciting announcement.

I know some of the details, but I am sworn to secrecy. I can tell you the following:

1. It's a fantastic blend of community, diversity, and art.
   
2. It will pretty up some very blah places.
   
3. It will perfectly capture the reckless joy and beauty of dance.
   
4. J.J. is awesome.
   
5. I hope to help him in this project.

So if you're available tomorrow, visit the City Hall in Mayor's Reception Room for a dance party and an announcement. Personally, I will be cursing my 9-5. And chair dancing.

I guess you can call me an actress now

(The first show)(went very well)(and I did not fall down).


Now to do it alllllll over again. Four more shows people. You know you want to come!

Fringelicious

So so so SO, the Fringe Festival begins in about a week and I've been all busy getting my little theatrical ducks in a row. Dress and shoes are sorted and today, thanks to the help of Sarah, I bought some kick ass jewelry for my costume. Still to do: Figure out something to do with my hair – which will most likely involve buying a set of hot rollers and teaching myself to actually style my hair, and buy some hooker red lipstick.

This past Monday, Dark Side Theater (the name for the theater company producing Murder!) participated in a Fringe Festival Preview at Play's and Player's Theater. This marked my first time on stage since I played Doctor #2 in our 7th grade production of "Doctor, Doctor." We performed a 10 minute scene that went off pretty well, despite the fact my knees were shaking the entire time, no lie. Even with my shaking knees, Jillian told me that I had "quite the strut" as I moved across the stage, so this gives me hope that I might actually live through this acting thing.

Anyway...the benefit of taking part of this preview show, aside from breaking my acting hymen, is that I got to see peeks of some other shows that will be going on and would like to make my official Fringe recommendations:

1. You're coming to see Murder!, right? You'd better.
   
   
2. And Trad too? Hello, you must. So good, you guys. And Mike Dees has already commenced with the head-shaving, so you know he's geared up.
   
   
3. The Power Of Magic: An International Commedia for Everyone by OMBELICO Mask Ensemble This was hilarious and incredible. I highly recommend it, AND it's free! You can't beat that.
   
   
4. Same Spirit Different Movement Fest by Illstyle & Peace Productions This is a dance production that incorporates all styles, but on Monday they just previewed the hip-hop bit. Still, it was pretty incredible and very fun.
   
   
5. 4Play by Secret Room Theatre Four plays, each about sex. Well, it is the Fringe, after all. The bit we saw was a section titled "Johnny Infamous," a Grease-like musical about a guy who likes to get off with inanimate objects. Utterly ridiculous, very funny, and extremely catchy songs.
   
   
6. Salesmanship For Life & Limb by Thomas Tirney & Tall Grass Productions My uncle is starring in this. Between me and my brother and now my uncle, this Fringe Festival is a real family affair.
   
   
7. Shakesploitation II Iambic Boogaloo by Iron Age Theatre R. Kelly and Juliet Trapped in the Closet. NEED I SAY ANYTHING MORE?
   
   
8. Improv Comedy by The N Crowd I'm going to be attending at least 3 performances of this, taking pictures until my camera breaks from the awesome. Join me!
   
   
9. 7 (x1) Samurai by David Gaines I don't think there's anything I can say about this that the trailer doesn't say.
   
   
10. Muralmorphosis which is where you will find me the weekend after all my Fringe shows.

Support local art and artists at the Fringe Festival!

The Vote of the People

Sarah advised me that Bartleby Snopes has a call for photos for their next issue. So I'm going to submit. But I need your help, because I don't know what to submit. I have about eleventy thousand photos, most of them portraits, interestingly enough. Also, I'm sort of unsure about what those Bartleby Snopes kids are looking for. Their first issue doesn't give me much to go from. Are they looking for more artsy? Sweet? Standalone photography art? So I'm going to ask you for your help. We're taking a poll here, people.

I've sifted through my Flickr, and come up with these 30. I've tried to find the ones most versatile, but feel free to look through and find others if your favorites aren't in here. Please vote in the comments!
Phew. Please vote early, vote often, and vote awesome. (FYI, there's no limit to the number I can submit, but I obviously want to submit my best work. You can list several, if you like.)


VOTING IS NOW CLOSED.

Thanks, everyone, for your help. I submitted something like 10 shots this morning and now we wait.

In the meantime, my brain is cooking. Looking over this lit journal made me miss working on Woodcrest all those years ago. I can't put my finger on it, exactly, but there's something so special and and exciting about working on a creative publication like this. I think I'd like to do it again. Anyone know of any lit journals that are looking for help? Anyone want to start a lit journal with me?


UPDATE

Well, that didn't take long. Not 10 minutes after I submitted, I got an enthusiastic email and it seems they will be using several of my shots. WOOT! Thanks for all of your help and advice!

See how I run

Last week at this time I was doing what I believe is known as, "Losing my Shit All Over the Place." I basically had ten million, frillion, septillion things to do, most with a Saturday deadline, so I was spazzing out everywhere.

I am pleased to say -- with a little help from friends -- I managed to get everything done that needed to get done. Huge, immense, incredible thanks go out to Tammi who did me the gigantic favor of taking my art to the gallery (Ok, ok, ok -- it's totally just a bar with art hanging on the walls. WHATEVER. THEY CALL THEMSELVES A GALLERY, SO I WILL TOO) on time for the drop off so that I could attend my cousin's graduation party.

Speaking of which, graduation party turned into Cousin-Palooza '08 with representation from all sides and factions of the family; it was lovely. Cousins are so awesome, and I can't tell you how much I enjoy and love all of my cousins' company. I feel lucky to be so close to them all, if not geographically then at least personally. Even more rad: I'll get to see most of them again at the end of the month when fellow cousin and Bishop (Oh, Cousin Bishop, as Carl would say) has his 25th anniversary of ordination. It's going to be fabulous.

The biggest accomplishment is that I got that fragging abstract done. I got it in right under the deadline at 11:49pm on Saturday. It was all kind of slapdash -- If you remember, I originally did paper on Hegel and Lacan, then the Doc advised me to just focus on one of the philosophers. So I chose Hegel, thinking that he would give me more to work with. I struggled all week long with this stupid abstract, really having issues with both the writing style and Hegel's philosophy (oh god, I HAAAAAATE Hegel -- he's impossibly dense and cerebral) and feeling quite discouraged. Then, at the Rosemont Reading on Friday night (which went really well, by the way, I got a good response on what I read), one of my fellow readers read a piece called, "Sarah Died From Her Lacanian Struggle" a fictional short story inspired be the Critical Theory class she and I both took, the class that spawned this paper in the first place. You guys, that story was exactly what I needed to hear. So at the eleventh hour, I changed my mind again and decided to focus solely on Lacan. So Saturday -- on the ride to my cousin's graduation -- I rewrote my abstract. I didn't run it by the Doc or anyone, I just sent it in. I don't think I did it properly, writing style-wise, but writing in a serious academic fashion is so difficult, and writing in serious academic fashion while still feeling like it was "my own" is darn near impossible. So I took a breath, trusted my gut and natural writing instincts and just did it. I have no idea if it will be accepted, but if it's not I'm OK with that. A lot of this exercise was about trying something new, putting myself out there. I did the best I could, and I am satisfied with myself. The bigger picture now is figuring out how to get myself to Ireland/the UK, because deep down, that's what this is really about. Omen-wise, this post of dorky Lacan jokes appeared on McSweeney's the same day. Which I don't take as an omen that I'll get to the conference, rather that I did the right thing writing about Lacan.

Meanwhile, summer classes continue to be crazy. My company's softball team continues to rock -- they're 6–0 right now. I may have finagled myself as a correspondent for Montgomery County Newspapers (I know. What? How did that happen? The editor for Ticket is my teacher for my summer class, and he invited me to do a few articles, that's how. Sadly, unpaid. Gotta start somewhere, I guess). Mike's girlfriend has temporarily moved in with us. I've told Gary he can move in with me come fall. (YEAH. What have I gotten myself into? This could be either incredibly bad or incredibly awesome. We'll find out which.) I've got another wedding this weekend, so it's home home home, and of course, more photos. Art show is TOMORROW NIGHT and I couldn't be more stoked. I hope to see you all there! You're coming, right? You're all invited! Come on, you know you want to drink booze with me and help me pretend I'm a famous artist!

It's a crazy, wild time I'm having this summer. I kind of like it.

Super Exciting Arty News

So in my last post, I hinted at something SUPER SECRET and awesome that I didn't want to jinx by talking about.

Well, now I can talk about it. Are you ready?

My friend Hunter, having seen some of my design work from the past semester, alerted me to a digital media art show and urged me to submit my work. The deadline for the open call was literally that very day (in fact, I had technically missed the deadline by 12 hours) but Hunter told me to go ahead and submit anyway. I figured balls to the wind, why not? So I went ahead and submitted three of my favorite pieces.

I just found out that one of my pieces was accepted.

Which one? Well, you're just going to have to come and see:

The Off the Wall Gallery/Dirty Frank's
NE corner of 13th and Pine, Philadelphia
ENTER DIGITAL
Opening Reception Thursday, June 5
7pm - 10pm
Show continues until Friday, August 1st.

People. My work is going to be FRAMED. Hanging in an ART GALLERY (ok, ok, a bar/art gallery -- but why quibble?). FOR SALE. I'm dying a little bit over here.

How Philly Moves

My favorite local photographer has a new project: How Philly Moves.

Any dancers out there? Hit it! You'll be famous!

I wonder if he has any Irish dancers signed up.

Trad

Well. One thing I will say: J.J. Tiziou I am not. It is HARD taking photos during a theater show and manage to be unobtrusive while still getting sharp, good shots. I did my best, although I don't think I succeeded on either level. I stopped shooting midway through the show since an audience member complained, which I felt really bad about. My brother brushed it off, saying that the guy was "obnoxious" and complained about everything from the seats to his neighbor's vibrating cell phone. Still, I can help but feel bad about it. That's your patron, dude. Besides, I know my shutter isn't the quietest thing in the universe, and I was taking a LOT of pictures. I had to be distracting.



I've been trying to think of a way to talk about my brother's show. Simply put, I think it was his best one yet. It starred Charlie DelMarcelle, Mike Dees, and Jared Delaney, the same three guys who were in last year's Fringe show, Crazy Gary's Mobile Disco. This show couldn't be more different, though. For one thing, it wasn't a monologue show, breaking from my brother's signature. For another, it was such a change in tone, theme, and style. It was sort of thrilling seeing these actors who played such tough, gritty, urbanites last year do a total 180 for this year's show.





The show was funny, really funny. Almost vaudeville. But then it stopped on a dime and became so beautiful and moving. I'm not going to lie to you. I cried both times I saw the show. Both times! Prior to this show I'd never cried at live theater, not ever. And I wasn't the only one. There were sniffles and tears everywhere in the audience.







A few words about my man Charlie up there. As I think I mentioned before, Charlie is my brother's good friend from high school. Well before high school, actually. So I've known Charlie since I was, like, six. Seeing Charlie in these shows has been such a huge eye-opener for me. Just like Charlie can't get past the mental image of me as a six-year-old, I have trouble getting past the mental image of him as my brother's goofy best friend. But you guys, WOW. I was impressed by his performance last year, but this year I was flat out blown away. He was nothing short of phenomenal. So fantastic, he was. When the show first started, I practically didn't recognize him because of his altered appearance. It wasn't just the shaved head. He looked thin and worn and about a million years old. I'm quite upset that my brother could only stage eight performances of the show. This means the show is not Barrymore eligible, which is a shame. If it was, Charlie would be all up on that. And, I'm quite sure my brother would be too.



Mike Dees and Jared Delaney gave quite excellent performances. Jared had the lucky task of reciting one of the most hysterical ridiculous monologues I've ever heard. Both times I saw the show the actors couldn't help corpsing each other. Not that either of the audiences seemed blame them, or care for that matter. And the end, with Mike! You really feel his loss and loneliness. He just slayed me.

I would be remiss in not mentioning the musician for the show, John Lionarons, who sadly I don't have any photos of, not really. You can see him peeking in the background of a couple of those shots there. His music added so much to the performance, especially that dulcimer number.

More photos can be seen here.

I has a fort

Oy. I had several ideas simmering for new entries, since it's been a full seven days (!) since I've posted anything. But then this morning I got an email that made me sad, and now it all seems kind of silly. Without going into too much detail, think some good thoughts about my friend. Do it because I say so and because you love me and I love her and she needs good karma/energy/whatever right now.

Since I don't feel like writing much, instead I give you photos, from recent Flickr updates. The first of which gives us the title of today's entry:



Dill has an unnatural attraction to my laptop bag. I'll come in and find him sleeping on it, kneading on it with his paws, or batting and chewing on the straps. Here, Dill has very cleverly constructed himself a fort using my laptop bag and the breakfast table. And I mean that quite literally. He somehow managed to flip open the flap of my laptop bag so it rested on the table (even though that means he probably had to stand on the table to do so WHICH HE IS NOT ALLOWED TO DO, DAMNIT DILL) and then curled up underneath and looked at me all, "What?" when I discovered him.

A bunch of photos from a recent Slaymo show, featuring my good friend from Cabrini days of yore, Mr. Mike H on the bass:









These are shown in black and white because, once again, they came out blurrier than I intended. I attribute this to the fact that I (1) need to stop being such a retard and figure out how to use my shutter speed/apature correctly since I refuse to use a flash, or (2) they were rocking SO HARD they made my camera malfunction. I'm going with #2. Although I do think I need another workshop with J.J. and I need some better lenses and a professional flash. Who wants to give me a big box of money?

After a certain point, I embraced the blur, as they say, and began to futz around with photoshop some more, for some interesting results:





And by "interesting" I mean, "photoshop brushes are my chrystal meth."

And hey, if your band is performing in the greater Philadelphia area and you want someone to photograph it? Drop me an email. I'm as cheap as free!

I took a bunch of shots of this adorable little boy at Beltane, because he totally stole my heart:



I mean, for real. Look at that face!

And just because I'm evil, I present this photograph of my roommate, Mike, drunk off his ass:



But before you think too poorly of me, may I add that the fool asked me to get my camera, because he "wanted to [hiccup/slur] document this."

And that, my little schmoopies, is all for now. I promise to update again soon, with a non-photo entry of substance when I'm feeling a little less sad-by-proxy.

You can never learn less, you can only learn more

Today I discovered a web zine that, simply put, is probably one of the most inspiring things I've looked at in a long time. Ladies and gentlemen: LAB.

First up, I love that cover. Second, what I enjoy about this zine (still in its "beta" form -- Christ, can you imagine what a non-beta issue will look like?) is that its very accessible in away that my other designery-inspiration zine fave, CANDY*, is not. Like, CANDY* is awesome and all, and amazing to look at, and I love it, but it also has a tendency to come across slightly snooty and cerebral. Like, we are all so creative and smart and making ART here, people. Which, yeah, fine. But LAB is much more along the lines of, yes we're artists and designers, creative and smart, but we're also having fun and you should too. And there seems to be this very conscious effort for LAB to be about learning in addition to inspiring. I've just read through two interviews and both of the interviewers make the point of asking questions along the lines of how did you do this/what to you use/what's your advice questioning instead of the tongue bath that CANDY* interviewers give to the designers they feature. I know it sounds like I'm bashing CANDY* a lot here, but I'm not. I love CANDY*, it's really fantastic. It's just on a different level than LAB, and I'm sort of enjoying the simplicity and level of LAB right now. So yes, check it out.