Reality Check (Testing, 1-2-3, Testing!)

Ok, world. I'm feeling combative, distressed, ruffled. A post on a blog I follow started this -- photos she took of a friend, photos her friend took of her. Glamour Artist photos. Been seeing more and more of those. Lovely, the photos, the subjects.

Lovely, but ...
a) why must we be Glamour Artists, and not just real women making art?
b) who can possibly afford such a photo shoot without sacrificing her art supply budget for two years?
c) Why do I feel like it's becoming not just sort of a competition of art, now, but of blog, of studio, and of self?

It's like Cosmopolitan Meets the Blog World -- our SELVES, bare bones, stripped, are not enough -- we have to have these photogenic & staged studios, these photogenic & staged blogs, these photogenic & staged selves -- make-up, ethereal dresses, fetching angles & almost-visible nipples-- some of it verges on soft porn, for cryin out loud! And I'm -- frustrated by it! This is women between women, perpetuating this -- er -- what is it? This MYTH, this stereotype, this hype! Everything, every one of our aspects physical, environmental, personal, always requiring a buff and a polish. Eesh, blimey, & shite!

Who is looking at these photos but other women artists, other women bloggers (predominantly)? Does anyone else get ruffled by this? Lovely as it is (and it IS), something just doesn't sit right in my gut about it.

And it's not enough that I totally GET this is these photographers' business, and that the ones I follow/read via their blogs are utterly sincere, genuine, real women, in and of themselves, even when unbuffed and unpolished. And yet -- AND YET -- ai! Lay me down in the tall grass, with a wispy, wizened bouquet and an Anthropologie Direct wardrobe and THEN take my picture? Why can't we just leave this behind? We've fought to rise from under it, to declare ourselves WOMAN in whatever way WE define, for so many decades. But no matter what, it seems, as women we yet must be alluring, too. Harkens back to an extension of that myth, another outdated belief structure: beautiful is better. Beautiful artist makes better art. Beautiful studio produces better art. Beautiful means more credible, more valuable, more intellectually capable, more able, more viable.

CRINGE!!

If I didn't know what any of my blogging posse looked like (& many I don't) or what their studios look like (the majority I don't), it wouldn't alter my impressions of them one iota. And I know this to be true of these particular photographers, shooting other artists in Glamour Artist shots. They're trying to capture the internal nuances of their subjects. I GET it! I do! and I want to accept it, as is, plain & straightforward ... but darnit, hard as I try, I still get ruffled.

Same reaction to the Where Women Create magazines all over the place, now. Who women? What women? Where women? Where are the studios like mine, with scabby hole-pucked walls, clogged, mismatched, unpainted, raw, tinseled with dust and pet hair, boxes, stuff stuff stuff -- organized but in makeshift, doable, affordable ways? Does the condition of my studio, my cleavage, my lack of a bouquet, make me a lesser artist, woman, presence? I gotta glam up to go in the studio now? Lipstick, & pumps, and Miss Congeniality sash all over again. NOOOOOOOO!!! I never ever want my own face in soft focus!

I stopped participating in the self portrait group because, and I quote myself here, "I always look like shite!" No technology or software in my possession to make myself over. OhmyGAWD I bought into it, didn't I? All of this is some kind of gimmick to put an appetite in women for the 'pretty' (the improved, the made over, the enhanced), when function serves us all so well -- and don't we all pretty up and personalize in our own ways, always, anyway? It's a marketing ploy -- spend spend spend -- on the magazine(s) at the very LEAST -- feel BADLY when you don't measure up in your crusty paint-smeared skort in your 'poor' studio. I want no part of it.

BUT!!! I'm aiming for shaking myself like a mangy dog when I project my own doubt and ruffly attitude on those who I know, without a doubt, don't deserve it. I trust these photographers, their talent, and their intentions, and when the bottom line is that I would trust any one of them to shoot photos of me, I know they don't deserve this rant at all.

But I'm also getting ready to show you WHERE THIS WOMAN CREATES -- my version of a reality check, cuz this is the most stunning, dream-filled place I have access to on a daily basis, and I'm the most stunning version I ever GET close to of myself when I'm in here. Do come in. The view upon opening my studio door. Looks like heaven on earth to ME! Shelves to the left of my studio desk. Home to eyelets, brads, all decorative papers, foamie rubber stamps, and my cherished magazines. Beth said she NEVER looks at old issues, but me? I'm in them ALL THE TIME!! CD player atop, with current most-listened to CDs and also books on CD. Stack of magazines currently getting my mojo a'slobbering! I have a color-system of tabs -- green ones mean inspiration for backgrounds for the LaBelle journal! My world -- the studio desk. Pens in a white metal picnic tin, embossing powders and Jacquard paints above, glue sticks, clothespins for drying, idea board presently pinned with Julification instructions, pattern-edged scissors, essential tools and glues in the back center, blotter paper in the middle, and to the right the stack of scrap copy paper I use for gluing, blobbing, heat gunning, 'processing'. I use the plates for palettes. Work horses: brushes and scissors. I got two of these white tin picnic thingies (meant for silverware) at Pottery Barn for $4.99 each ... score, Babee, score!!! Close up of the 'Julification tin' -- all the major ingredients of/for my Julification class housed there, vintage index card file (metal). LOVE that thang! The overflow fridge, which I want to drop kick outta here every minute of every day, except that at least the diet coke with lime and beer are handy. Pfft. I could USE that space, I'm tellin ya! Atop: shoe boxes holding sorted, cherished letters from family, envelope boxes full of gifts sent from overseas, my GBC binder, and a 1-31 monthly sorter personalized to hold stickers, words, rub ons, die cuts, alphabets, overlays. You know, stuff! Facing the center of the closet -- Zoe's personal magic carpet, the rolling red tool box. Stamp pad inks and goops behind, markers and spray inks atop. The plastic bins hold tools, stencils, bits left over from backgrounds, spare brushes and scissors ... you know, stuff! The ceiling fan (which, oddly, is working today -- normally it never wants to do that!), the peeling plaster from major leakage 3 years ago, the vent that has to be replaced. Homey, ain't it? The drying table ... also Business Central (home of bills, stamps, etc.). Also usually covered over with all the magazines I'm perusing for inspiration, stuff I bring home from work and drop to the surface, my purse, business filing I don't wanna deal with, you know ... STUFF! But I have to leave a trail for Zoe to get up in her window basket or up on the window ledge. My treasured filing cabinet, a gift from My Lovely Mother 4 years ago ... organized to the Nth degree, folders by subject, filled with the images I use on my journal backgrounds. Also houses my various printer papers, and blank journals. A beautiful beautiful thing, my filing cabinet! Atop, my flock collection, along with a favorite elephant and a frog from my Beloved Aunt Judy. DUSTY!!! (I'm so proud!) Letting the outdoors in, I yam! In the right closet corner: scanner and cords, binders full of rubber stamp sets, box of 11 x 17 'blotter' paper, air compressor in 'visa' bag which my oldest bro' hasn't had time to teach me how to use yet. Box o'stuff that used to be on the walls in the kitchen, currently undergoing replastering. Soiled stuff, including Zoe bombs, on the left. Recycle on the right. It's a fairly 'green' studio, yup. Still with me? Or did I SCARE ya?!! Litter box essentials. Under my studio (working) desk. Map drawers house the majority of my rubber stamps. Deco tapes. Basket o'necessaries like paper towels. Zoe trying to dodge out of the picture, lower left. Under the drying table behind my studio desk. Magazines I use for images, words, patterns -- I've foregone the rip-n-tear-then-file system for now. I've also stopped adding magazines to the pile. My old wallpaper books also live here. And Zoe's food dish and water bowl and launched litter. She IS a litter launcher, that furry wench, regardless of the huge blue storage container I made into her litter box! Books to be read, atop. Completed journals, vintage envelope collection (in white seagull box); vintage black & white photo collection in blue cigar box. Accumulated cardboard, which yes, I use. Dark recesses of a closet corner. Luggage for England trip buried back yonder, oh noooOOOo. Massive ... music ... collection! That's my story and I'm sticking to it. Peace out.