Triumph Over Depression, Please

I’m halfway to my collection of ten. This is a re-interpretation of an old idea and a piece I did a couple of years ago, ‘Injektilo.’ It means syringe. It is one of my favorite words in Esperanto. The piece is based on the triumph of reason over superstition.

I can feel it again, this depression, this crippling depression. There is no hope for the future, this weekend is going to be miserable, and there is really no good reason to get up in the morning. I can feel the weight of everyone’s judgmental eyes on me, and I reek of disappointment. I’m constantly hurting and disappointing people. But despite all of this, I wake up early in the morning to start my day. The world is so cruel that it doesn’t even let me sleep long enough to enjoy a longer escape. Instead, the hours and the minutes drag like molasses, each second slowly passes with the threat of some phantom axe about to drop on me. God bless the people around me who try to be cheerful and make the day better, and I try to reciprocate and smile back with a clever quip or two, but God help me, it’s been very difficult lately. Talking to myself hasn’t been good for months now. I can be quite jovial, but I’m very mean-spirited, especially to myself. It’s not good. It’s not good. It’s not good. Things will never be okay again.

Yesterday I tasted a lone cherry seed. It was bittersweet and tasted like almonds and cherries as it lingered and I crushed it in my mouth. I was too much of a coward to try another one. I’m curious but cowardly. I’m not there, yet. Besides, I still have work to finish.

A World of Kicking

As I mentioned before, I try to impose challenges on myself on these new set of crowded drawings. This time, I challenged myself to fill a page full of kicking… yes, kicking. It’s a dumb and meaningless subject, but the satirical and nonsensical are key essences of the Dada Movement.

I was going to post this on Instagram in a few weeks or so, but after learning that some student is basically implementing a similar strategy as I’ve been doing for Inktober, I decided to do a child-safe version of this piece. Just like Wu-Tang Clan, I’m for the children.

Art to Go

I’ve been thinking of alternative ways of presenting art and making purchasing art more convenient and affordable for people. Or course making art cheaper is not for everyone, but I also think that sometimes art doesn’t have to be expensive nor an investment that should be hung on a wall. Sometimes, they can just be images to be admired. So I came up with what I would for now call “art to-go.”

Imagine art books with up to ten pages, or maybe a small collection of art prints, in an over-sized, sturdy envelope. The envelope is windowed, so the content can be seen from the outside, much like bills and other windowed envelopes work. The only difference in this case is that the window doesn’t have an opaque film over it. The edge of the envelope has a black border not so much to simulate a frame but to separate the envelope from the wall behind it should the whole envelope be hung. The back of the envelope would have a plastic attachment that would make hanging it like a picture frame possible.

Now, when someone enters the gallery, they can admire the works and simply purchase them off the wall and take it home the same day. The curator can simply replace them with another copy. Because they are all essentially packaged prints, with no expensive mats or frames, buying art is made cheaper.

As for the originals, that is up to the artist. Personally, I think they are inconsequential at this point because the “art” is the collection itself. They are essentially art books or art prints being sold in a gallery type of setting. Now, the gallery might lose out on commission by not selling framed originals, but they can more than make up for it by selling cheaper art prints.

I’m so tired.

Long weekends are horrible nightmares. They are catalysts for depression. I had half a mind to just jump off a building and kill myself already, but then I figured, I should at least finish the book I’m making before I totally commit. I realize I won’t be missed at all. I’m an incredibly shitty human being. But I like to think that my work would be missed or at least appreciated after I’m gone. At least there’s that. So maybe leave off failed nighttime parkour accidents for a while until I’ve printed a copy of the book I’m working on.

Speaking of works. This latest one was inspired by Alfred Hitchcock’s Rear Window and the covers of Nancy Drew and Hardy Boys novels. I know, the references are ancient and outdated, but I don’t care. In this piece, I tried to draw things which intimidate me to draw, specifically, wheelchairs or anything with spokes, the mirror on mirror effect, pool reflections, and directly referencing another famous work of art. This one references Juan Luna’s ‘Spoliarium.’ Juan Luna, just like me, is also a shitty human being. He shot his Spanish wife and his mother-in-law. I can’t stand him, and I can’t stand how his boring works are venerated. What a piece of shit! But really, almost all good artists are pieces of shit. Pablo Picasso, Auguste Rodin, Edgar Degas, Paul Gaugin… the list is long. Of course, I’m not saying I’m a great artist like the people I listed. I’m pretty certain I will be easily forgotten when I’m gone. But I believe I’m equally a piece of shit like the rest of them.