How did I miss this?!

I’ve just come out of my religious studies class with a weird epiphany about my life and artistic process. My brain has been sort of hinting at the absence of my academic classes and the sense of satisfaction I get when I write essays that prove arguments or explore grand concepts. I love conceptual thinking that’s built up with evidence. I even like conceptual thinking that’s based in supernatural evidence, what some scholars term “sketchy”. Ultimately, the overlap is there within the foundation.

My favorite element across all artistic mediums is contrast. I love contrast. Maybe that establishes itself in the physical contrast of the work, or maybe the way the light hits a sculpture at a specific time of day or maybe there’s something else there in terms of color and that just hits me because that sensational pop against my mind makes me feel something deep. I’m not sure yet.

What I’m realizing is that i need to be in a field of work that allows me to explore conceptual contrasts and reaffirm different ideas through writing and research. I crave research like water. The problem solving I experience through writing and essays is akin to the feeling of figuring out which color to use within a painting or ceramic glaze. It’s equally as satisfying. Psychologists refer to this feeling as “flow”. My flow lives in conceptual problem solving.

I loved writing my essay on Cindy Sherman and I’m so stoked to write my fifteen page research paper contrasting buddhist ideals. I’m sort of dying to figure out the rest of my painting. I have no idea how I’m going to do on my history midterm Tuesday but the immense satisfaction that just began flowing through me has put me over the moon. This is the first time since my disengagement with photography that I’ve felt similarly stimulated and profoundly grateful. This feeling. This feeling right now is what I live for.

2:28am

Obligations
Affiliations
Incarceration
Connotation
Bureaucracy and blurred red lines
Sharpness of indecency
I hate this need to fight authority
My stupid desire to break the rules
Has more power over me than I do
This strange contradiction
Fuels my conviction
And I’m faced over and over
The whisper of memories fade
Replaced by rage
I’m not angry

My neck keeps shaking
My Russian teachers always made me cry

I hated bending and twirling
As long as they were there
I knew only good and bad
No compromise

I’m so very clearly there
Pick and choose the parts that make sense
My family says it’s easier to digest
I’m not craving
The Buddha says
But his golden body glows
I’ll swipe green across canvas
And spend hours on circles and spirals and waves
Tiny little pencil marks
One thing out of place
Daylight balance, warm tone, cool
Wipe clean the rules

In a field where the human condition
Is the one and only true theme,
Why did I stick myself in a place
Where identity is destroyed
And smiles quickly employed
And evil ovals stare at me
Across the plastic tables
“Not excused, sorry but that doesn’t count, you’ll still have to pay”
Okay.

2:17am

As I struggle with my own identity over the last few months, I realize that I was so frustrated by being marginalized with my community. People kept seeing me as a person I didn’t associate with directly. I thought sure, maybe there is some overlap but that’s not representative of me completely; there’s more than meets the eye. I realize now that being marginalized is actually way better because it allows me to remain somewhat out of reach. I can pick and choose which part of my community I associate with and which part I don’t. It’s nice because it’s safer there. I have more freedom to flow freely between circles. There is no group with one claim on me. That’s a double edged sword sometimes because it means I hear about things late sometimes but I make an in impression on people so there’s always someone who remembers. In many ways, it’s that same alienation that allows me to stand out. I think it’s silly that this all occurs to me as I’m browsing on amazon for a laptop cover. As a student, it’s those choices that will define how my friends and peers see me. Do I choose to blend in, or stand out? Or is it more so a question of accepting who I’m already perceived to be?