If you've never seen the movie Waking Life, I highly recommend it. It does something totally counter to what Popular Media usually does, it makes a boring subject interesting. Basically the film is a recording of conversations between a Young Man seeking knowledge and different characters discussing Life and it's Various Manifestations. Oh, and it's animated. The animation is used in a unique way, it acts as a visual demonstration of the philosophical ideas being debated. Ideas like the definition of reality, what's real and what's not, and where the controls are situated. If you close your eyes, you could be listening to Meet The Press in the next room but on screen your eyes are dazzled and liberated.

One of the questions raised by Waking Life is where is the line between our dreams and what we call "real". If recent World Events are any indication, the borders are more liquid than we'd believe.

Last night I dreamt of a time when I still lived in NYC. I was working at a Calvin Klein Fashion Show, backstage with all the SuperModels natch, and several Fashionista Ex-Associates were in My Dream as well.

Around eight, I was awoken by Peggy in the kitchen. When her water dish is empty, she takes her paw and raps the ceramic on the floor and makes a noise like a convict's cup on Cell Bars. I got up and refilled her dish, pondering whether to start my day. Instead I climbed into bed and fell back asleep. I dreamt again of New York, walking along Seventh Avenue and running into Fashionista Ex-Associate. "Oh my god!", I exclaim in my dream,"I just had a dream about you!"

I proceeded to describe, in my dream, the dream I'd had and for one split second lost track of where I stood in the matter. Was I dreaming the Dream or was the Dream dreaming me? I awoke, I think, to Life. The Life I call reality. My Waking Life. If I think of flying, I'm still not sure it isn't possible and the thought adds wings to my day.

9:47:16 PM    sro home /

In the LA Times today was an article about a proposed Richard Serra sculpture on the campus of Cal-Tech. Despite Serra generally being acknowledged as one of the greatest sculptors of our time, there's been an "uproar" over plans to install one of his pieces on a plot of grass that is currently "adorned with students tossing Frisbees". One scientist/teacher at the school said she can "envision a work of soaring excellence that would equal in creativity the innovation for which Cal-Tech is so well known" and the article goes on to state she "can't imagine the sculpture that has actually been designed."

As a visual artist, I was particularly amused at this scenario. A biologist-slash-teacher has made her decision about what should inhabit the space. She's not really sure what that would be but apparently it's something, you know, creative. Something to match the "innovation" at Cal-Tech, innovation that obviously stops short of Artwork. The whole ado pretty much kills the "innovation" angle and that this scientist was unaware of the inherent irony speaks volumes.

Yet, she "can't imagine the sculpture that has been designed". Uh, maybe that's cause she's not a sculpter. In fact, she doesn't even have to imagine it, there's a rendering of the whole thing right next to the LA Times article. Another student, this one a doctoral candidate says, "It is aesthetically unpleasing and artistically insignificant. I would love a Serra piece on the site, maybe one of his beautiful buoyant rounded ones." Nice of her to take time out of her busy candidacy to clear up this whole "art thing". Maybe if she just e-mailed the rest of the world what Art she finds Significant, it would save alot of WannaBe Artists some time. Her Short List of Acceptable Art does seem to include Pretty Things - bouyant, like bubbles and fluffy clouds. Maybe something in a color that would match the sofa.

God forbid they erect something that might disrupt the Frisbee Field. God forbid that in the supposedly few years students attend Cal-Tech they're made to walk around the grass and not through it. God forbid they're forced to Imagine - imagine seeing the world a different way, imagine relating to a sculpture that forces you to be present with an Idea, imagine their Important Lives must accept ways of thinking that aren't in line with their own. It makes me wonder what Einstein would have said about a place which contains so many small and closed minds.

1:38:04 PM    sro home /

12:53:36 AM    sro home /