Princess Series #1 (continued)

Introducing...President Princess. I finished her a while back, but finally mustered enough energy to glaze & capture her on camera:




Here is the back story (from my etsy page):
Painted with acrylic paint on a 12x16 canvas, President Princess rolls up her sleeves for another day in the Oval Office. Today, she is signing the Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay Restoration Act (actually, Obama signed it on January 29, 2009). Two flags hang solemnly behind her as she sits at the gigantically intricate presidential desk. On the left is a photo of Prince Charming. He is in the East Wing hosting a NOW luncheon.
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For this princess series, I was both inspired & horrified by my nieces’ fascination with the Disney princesses.

I’ll explain:
One niece owned a small projector that showed snapshot frames of the Cinderella movie, and as she flipped from scene to scene, I read from a recapitulation of the classic fairytale. I was struck by the archaic storyline. Cinderella is a graceful, destitute orphan with abnormally small feet, & the dashing prince chases after her down the castle steps, as all men should…Hmph. I was especially appalled by the epilogue that followed the Cinderella story. It told of Cinderella’s wedding planning fiasco; she couldn’t find the right dress, pick the right cake, or send out the invitations on time. Then…Bibbidibobbideeboo! Her fairy godmother appears & fixes everything in time. Here I was planning my own wedding day – simultaneously, my 5-year-old niece was reading about this glorified legal communion as if it were the happiest day of every girl’s life.

When their princes are off play Fantasy Football, independent princesses have to face the world on their own. They have to snake their own toilets, wash their own cars, & wipe sleepy gunk from their eyes.

So I decided to paint a series of princesses performing un-princessly activities. I started with Pooping Princess but accidentally dropped lint all over it when I folded laundry. I tried again with Porcelain Princess, pictured below. Punky Princess, President Princess, and Premenstrual Princess are also or will be listed in my shop.

All these paintings are one-of-a-kind originals.

We princesses do more than sit on thrones like pretty dolls. We poop too.

Princess Series #1

A few weeks ago, I completed two princess paintings: Porcelain Princess & Punky Princess. I will soon post them on my etsy site.





With her fingers tightly clutched, Porcelain Princess is focusing on one of the most important activities of her day. She is painted in acrylic on a 12x16-inch stretched canvas. There are multicolored jewels glued into her crown & the side border is painted a dark purple. Typical of my paintings, I’ve used gold acrylic paint to form a bumpy frame on the edge of the canvas. The title and my symbol (a genie bottle with a smoky fist) are written in fabric paint on the lower right edge of the painting.





Punky Princess is painted in acrylic on a 12x16-inch stretched canvas. There are clear jewels glued onto her crown. She dons a leather jacket as she thrashes to rock music in a discotheque. Her perfect hair is undone in a wild mess & she flashes, as Wikepedia calls it, the “sign of the horn”. Patches of light glow in the background. The side border is painted green, and, typical of my paintings, I’ve used gold acrylic paint to form a bumpy frame. The entire painting is protected with a water-based acrylic glaze.

Loneliness

Recently, a college friend watched Me, You & Everyone We Know with my recommendation, & she loved it. It discussed a topic that she has been dealing with recently: loneliness.

Robby and I discussed this last night. How bad can loneliness get? He was never lonely much; he has always been extremely sociable & surrounds himself by people constantly. He said that he used to pull out a list of friends' phone numbers & call them one by one. I have been lonelier in my life longer than Robby has. I was very productive when I was single & alone. Sure, I spent hours in cafes sewing, drawing, and reading, but I went through my biggest changes when I was single. I wrote in a diary, letters, poetry...I was immensely creative when I was alone. But, Robby countered, you didn't have anyone to share your ideas with. True.

I think back to reading What Was She Thinking? by Zoe Heller (it was made into a fantastic film called Notes on a Scandal). The narrator, a 60-some-year-old acrid spinster teacher, talks about loneliness in one chapter. She asserts that married people will never know the feeling of being lonely & single for decades. Their experience of loneliness was a 6 months they were single between boyfriends. But she knows loneliness very well, coming home to an empty flat, brushing up against a stranger & feeling a tinge in the groin...What is it like to be lonely & single for your entire life?

Then Robby & I began talking about the loneliness one feels when one is in a large group. Is it better to be lonely alone or lonely in a large group, say, at a big party? I would prefer being lonely alone. I don't like being around people when there is nothing to say, and I am especially awkward when everyone looks like they are having fun, and I am not. I enjoy being productive when I am alone, but I don't like coming home to a silent apartment with no one to talk to or have dinner. Being married is wonderful. We don't feel the need to chat all the time, and we can spend the entire day at home working without talking to each other. That's okay with us. No need to feel self-conscious, no need to impress. We like each other at our sloppiest, & that's the best thing about marriage so far.

LA isn't so bad

Robby & I spent a perfect day with friends yesterday. It was a beautiful Saturday - clear skies, temperatures in the mid-70s. Robby & four friends played basketball at the YMCA while I worked out in the gym. I got a good 2.5 mile run in while they played a friendly game of 2 on 2.
We came home, showered, packed some snacks & some blankets, & headed to Mitsuwa, a local Japanese market. Picked up some sushi, edamame, & drinks. A few more friends joined us & we headed to the end of Ocean Park Blvd. We set up camp on the grass under the shade of some tall palm trees & pulled out the food. After a light meal, we played many rounds of bocce ball on a long, empty stretch of grass, while an old Russian man watched us from a bench. Then we moved our arrangement to the beach and flew a kite.
In the late afternoon, we went to Alibi Room in Culver City to try out the popular Korean BBQ Tacos from Kogi. It's been getting a lot of press lately, and some people follow the taco truck's schedule, but the Alibi Room serves its food. Unfortunately, as 8pm on a Saturday night, it was unlikely that we'd find a table. Plus, the restaurant didn't take reservations. It looked modern and pretentious, like Father's Office, so that was a turn-off. We went to our reliable Tacomiendo on Inglewood Avenue instead (delicious Mexican food, large portions). Then we brought the food home & watched one of Robby & my favorite movies, Me, You, & Everyone We Know. It's a magical & artistic movie, and Robby and I talked about it until we fell asleep. The most well-known line is "I want to poop back and forth. I'll poop in her butt hole and she'll poop it back into my butt hole. And then we keep doing it back and forth. With the same poop. Forever."

Jeanne the Arteeeest

It has been awhile (a month exactly) since I posted on our blog. We've had a slew of events happening in our exciting newly married lives - entertaining visiting family members, trip to Disneyland, disappointing attempt at skiing at Mountain High...Oi. I don't want to expound on the huge disappointment we experienced at Mountain High (it fell on a day when we were constantly indecisive) but to say that we now have 2 4-hour vouchers for the same measly resort. I can't seem to sell them on craigslist.org, so we might have to return to use them.

Sorry for the tangent; these vouchers have been weighing on my mind.

My main topic for today's entry: MY ETSY PAGE.

jeanneloh.etsy.com

I finally opened a seller's etsy page because I have stuff to sell! Paintings & drawings, to be exact. I have 5 items on sale right now. I am a big fan (and a big purchaser) of etsy.com, so I am honored to join the ranks of etsy sellers, who are all super-crafty and creative people. I don't mean super-crafty as sly and devious.

Please support me by taking a look at my page.

Thanks!

Jetsetters

One of Robby's classmates calls us "jetsetters". So far this year, we've been to New Jersey, Denver, and San Francisco. Tomorrow, we're leaving for Utah for a wedding. May: Chicago; June: Japan; July: Berlin... I swear, Robby needs a secretary for all the conferences he goes to. I have to plan the Japan trip and Robby needs to plan Chicago, Berlin, and our subletters for the two months we're gone. Who knows how we'll afford these travels? The experience is more valuable than worrying about how we'll pay for it...I think.

Jetsetters we are!

We love Live Theatre!

A few nights ago, we saw live theatre: Taking Over, a one-man show by Danny Hoch. We saw it almost a year ago in Berkeley. His performance is moving and dynamic. It's all about the recent gentrification of Brooklyn. His audience really relates to the stories because many of us who go to the shows are the ones who are gentrifying the "dangerous" neighborhoods. At the end, he read letters from audience members. They share their confusion: "Wait, I'm a white male from Missouri living in Harlem. I'm voted for Obama & I'm a good guy. How come you don't have a character like me in the play?" I think people walk away thinking about his message. They try to think about a solution. Hoch presents the paradox that people always move away from home to find themselves. Why has Brooklyn turned into a sojourn for these yuppies? I walked away thinking, "What would it have been like to have stayed in Orange County all these years?" He's right, many kids from the suburbs move to the city to discover their identity and fall in love with the grittiness and density of the urban environment. But, eventually, we all leave. We leave the cities after having raised the housing prices and the price of almond croissants. In our wake, we leave a myriad of art galleries and cafes. Even though, Hoch doesn't give a solution, he gives us plenty to think about, and he offers a voice to those who don't have one.