the joys of forced relaxation

In a haze, a stormy haze
I’ll be round, I’ll be loving you, always

Always

Here I am and I'll take my time

Here I am and I’ll wait in line, always

Always

-"Parachutes" by Coldplay

one of my favorites from my class. i don't remember if it was on the exam, but i don't think i'll ever forget it. it's Filippo Lippi's Madonna and Child with Stories of the Life of St. Anne (1452). i just wanted to share it with you.

i've been sick all weekend, but i don't have any swine related illness, just your average cold. nothing to do but sleep, watch hulu and drink my weight in o.j.. i'm in the library right now, procrastinating the work i didn't do this week lol. or well in my mind i'm 'multi-tasking', but it's just a slow process of accomplishment. all in all though, i feel much better. happy to blog again. maybe tomorrow i'll come back on and have something a bit more exciting. til then, i hope your monday isn't too rough. ciao,

-Genevieve

something about table settings

i can't believe it's tuesday already. where did the weekend and monday go? well, i hope you had a nice weekend and your monday wasn't too tough. i've been writing papers and now studying for my first art history exam. things are crazy, but i'm enjoying what i'm studying so i guess it's ok.

on saturday night i went out to dinner with some friends to this really cool pizza place. i took some shots while we were waiting for the food and they also have a store with knick knacks and things. i took a pic of a door that was decorated all in beads and little decorations. i'm completely in love with this idea. i hope i can somehow recreate that door, maybe in a table or something. and last night with some people that live in my building, we had a mini tea party. so i took some shots of the scrumptious food of course. i have this new found interest in photographing tables with eating utensils and glasses. here they are...

happy news: i bought some dyes and t-shirts with my friend to tie-dye. hopefully we can squeeze it into our schedule soon.

and i don't really think many people do this but this is my 50th blog post :) woo. i think it's kinda cool, maybe it's just me.

anyway, hope you are doing well. sending warm thoughts your way, be back soon,

-Genevieve

the rebirth and rekindling of my love

how incredible is this painting? just sayin. this is The Arnolfini Portrait by Jan van Eyck painted in 1434. want to see something cool? ok here it is. i don't think i have words to describe how much i enjoy the renaissance. got to go back to my studies, but hope all is well. sending some posi+ive energy your way,

-Genevieve

the tide of a new week

tonight i'm in the library, watching online lectures, catching up on the reading that was not read this weekend. i went home for the weekend and spent saturday and sunday as much time as i could at the beach. it was a lovely and relaxing escape. there's nothing better than laying down and listening to the waves crash on the shore. i was imagining doing yoga on the beach. that would be pretty amazing, one day i shall do that. well, i hope your monday wasn't too bad. i've been really inspired lately with coldplay's viva la vida cd and i can't get enough of santana's "samba pa ti" as per usual. how cool is the strawberry swing vid? i don't know, maybe it's just me, but i think it's genius and entertaining. coldplay is perfect to listen to when i'm walking around campus and daydreaming, staring at the trees. i really need to see santana before i die or well, he does. he's perfect to listen to when i'm hanging out or studying. speaking of which, i should go back to the lecture tab on this window lol. oh and the pic above i found on flickr, it just made me smile, so i wanted to share it.
anyway, hope you have a great week, i shall be back tomorrow hopefully with a mini adventure story. until then,

-Genevieve

darius went west and is still rolling

tonight i went to go see screening of the film "Darius Goes West: The Roll of His Life" and i don't really have words to explain what i felt. it made a big impact on me though. it's a documentary about the story of Darius Weems who has Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy (DMD) and wants to get MTV to pimp out his wheelchair on "Pimp My Ride" and travel around the U.S. he and his 11 friends take a road trip from his hometown Athens, Georgia to go west to California. this film makes you laugh and cry and really see disabilities in a new light. his story is not the only inspiring part of the story, it's him and his attitude. i can't even begin to describe how amazing of a person he is. you'll just have to see it for yourself. through dariusgoeswest.org, you can see the entire film for free. i encourage you not only to see it because it is an amazing film, but also to learn about DMD and the efforts that are being done to find a cure.

so here you go:

oh and darius and some of his crew came to the screening at my school and darius is currently 19 going on 20 this month. hope all is going well,

-Genevieve

this is totally an adventure story

on sunday night, i went to go see The Brothers Bloom. it was very smartly written, created, directed, edited. you name it. i literally laughed out loud and not because it was stupid funny or so ridiculous that i was compelled to chuckle, but i laughed because it was so intelligent. so wonderfully unexpected and had little parts that were just ingenious. if the trailer at all interests you, go see it. it's a very unforeseen ending, but it's a great ending. i found the screenplay online if you're interested. but if you can, just go experience it. enough said.

now i have to go back to studying renaissance art. buona notte,

-Genevieve

the tree could be man's best friend

i don't like to make any partial posts on religion per se but i felt like writing about this thought. i'm taking a native american religions course and one of the main discussions is animism. i find it a very captivating subject. the idea that every person, animal, plant, even manmade objects could have souls or spirits. whatever religion or belief or way of life that you practice, i think there should still be an underlining importance to respect the world around us. i believe that by being one of many species/things/objects, our actions have consequences. even if you're atheist, there is an earth around us, there is a universe that we belong to and even if we are one little spec in a vast space, we do have an impact on a piece of that space. it's sad to me to think that as humans we make ourselves the most important beings. yes, we are important, but we aren't the only ones. look around you. there are living creatures that's lives and existence is affected by us. many probably think that going outside and communicating to a tree is a bit strange, but in a sense, by any interaction you have with it (i.e. planting, watering, cutting, climbing) you are communicating with it. at least, an animist would claim so. what or whom decided that because plants don't speak our language we can't speak to them? we talk to our pets. we talk to animals in the zoo or park. we even talk to the fly that keeps flying in our face. sometimes we end up talking to furniture or appliances. although maybe the latter is because of some complaint. still, why not plants?

either way, we should respect them. that is giving them care and possibly love and what living thing doesn't want to be cared for? sometimes people argue that we should take care of our earth so that our grandchildren will have a green earth. but is that really enough reason. shouldn't it be because they matter too? i don't know. maybe i'm just expecting that people would feel compelled to care for a plant the way that we care for a pet. that might just be the way i see things. well, to show you who i love, check out the pic. it's my basil plant. her name is Zola, which means "piece of earth". and yes, i do communicate with her. she's my sunshine and i love waking up and seeing her while i eat breakfast. hopefully, i will one day have a garden for her.

i encourage you at least to next time stop and think about what you see around you. our planet is beautiful place full of beautiful beings and things. maybe even try to communicate with it. you never know what might happen. i'm no shaman, but i do know that amazing things happen when i open up myself to the world around me.

i hope you had a restful and groovy holiday weekend, i know i did. now back to reality,

-Genevieve

tie-dye things and random musings

as promised, pics of my tie-dye adventures this summer. i dyed three shirts and a purse that i sewed together. i put a bunch of colorful buttons, that ended up dying the cloth as well, which gave it an unexpected effect. i was pleased with the outcome. i plan on doing some more, hopefully soon. i love the way you don't know how it's going to turn out. you can never replicate an exact dye twice. each is an individual beauty and occurence. everytime i went to take off the rubber bands and unravel the twists and turns, it was like christmas morning when you're a kid. don't know what to expect but you're secretly wishing for somthing that you wanted, but getting something else is still getting a surprise. it's amazing.

and here are my random musings of jellyfish on friday and saturday night. i started with the markers and colored pencils, then did a simple sketch with graphite pencils and then went on to watercolor. the green one of the markers was something i titled 'cabbage or jellyfish' lol. i haven't done any charcoal sketches, but i might do one in the next couple of days. i have this idea floating around in my brain, that i might try to do in my sketch pad with graphite pencils. hopefully it will turn out or convey what i want. if it works, i'll share it.

and i also included a graphite sketch from either early summer or late spring semester. i couldn't get the hair, so i won't even show it here but i'll show you her face. and also i was playing around with watercolor and it only makes sense to put up it, since it's the slogan for this blog. anyway, i felt like sharing some work. it's nothing that great, i know, but i've never put anything up other than photography so i felt like spicing it up a bit.

i hope your holiday weekend is going lovely, i'll be back soon with some thoughts on animism,

-Genevieve

drifting to a new way of thinking

we watched the Seasonal Seas episode of the film The Blue Planet by BBC in my wildlife issues course. it had beautiful shots and it was incredible how they captured all the underwater creatures. when i was little, i hated jellyfish, well maybe not jellyfish themselves but the jellyfish bites or attacks. they stung pretty bad and one time i had one get me all over my legs. in spanish jellyfish are "aguamalas", a compound word of "water" and "bad". so, throughout my life i haven't really been a big fan. but after watching the film, all i wanted to do was sketch a jellyfish or paint a watercolor. that's on my mini creative to-do list. sometimes we associate something with an emotion, and it's incredible to look at it in a new light. we sometimes take things for granted from experiences we've had or how we've been brought up. but it's really intriguing to have that concept challenged. jellyfish are beautiful creatures, and although i still don't want to have a physical encounter, i have a new found appreciation for them. they float so peacefully and almost seem angelic in their tranquility. i put together the above jellyfish mosaic with pics from flickr and the youtube vid below is jellyfish in Hong Kong Ocean Park that i just found kinda cool. they apparently have lights in the tanks that change colors and makes the jellyfish look amazing.
i'm gonna go try to draw some jellyfish, but i hope you have a sweet holiday weekend. be back soon,

-Genevieve

heading down happy avenue

ok, so i just want to say that if you are even remotely interested in the 60's hippie revolution or Woodstock itself, 'Taking Woodstock' is something you should go check out. it was incredible. the focus is placed more on the main character's journey to bring the festival to his town and his struggles and successes, but it shows so much cultural and historical insight that it really captured the time and place that Woodstock was. they didn't show music, just played it in the background, but they showed the long backed-up line of people and the hills full of all the spectators. there's so many little details that made me smile and laugh about the time period and what was groovy back then. demetri martin was impressive and i loved emile hirsch, as well. so basically, good reviews all around, if you like time pieces and especially if you like the hippie era. go check it out, it's far out man.

now i just have to go see 'Paper Heart' with Charlyne Yi and Michael Cera. looks like a really adorable and intriguing documentary/story. i saw the trailer for it and was hooked. it's showing in a theater near campus so maybe i'll go see in the next few weeks. here's the trailer, hope it sparks your interest.

if you do go see it, let me know what you think. no spoilers though, please. that's just not cool lol, but a general yay or nay kinda thing. hope your week got off to a good start. peace,

-Genevieve