Here's a Good Idea with No Strings Attached

Honestly, it's good to know that when I'm finally ready to go to Crazy Town, I can count on some of you to join me there. We'll have fun. It'll be like summer camp.

I was envisioning a smackdown between Walker Evans and Dorothea Lange. They were getting into it over who gets to take photos of Depression Era migrant workers. Because god knows you can only have one person doing that sort of photography.

The truth is that real artists don't have time for that shit. They're too busy creating and doing to worry about what other people are up to.

***

I was thinking about the subject of the previous post, and what it means to have good ideas and what it means to be an artist. I learned my lesson about this a long time ago:

1. There is no such thing as an original idea.
2. No matter how good you think you are, there's always someone out there who's a. doing what you're doing already, and b. probably doing it 1000 times better than you are.
3. You can't prevent other people from doing the same thing as you. And if you were to even try, all it does is diminish you.
4. If you call yourself an artist and you end up being jealous of other people's skills, or whatever your insecurities are that make you think that you're the only one who can do what you do and that it's possible for other people to steal your thunder, you're going to be fucking miserable.

***

Years ago, I used to make very intricate and complicated jewelry using glass seed beeds. Someday I'll find some photos to share with you. I didn't start out wanting to make jewelry or even thinking of having a business.

I went to a Native American Pow-wow one summer evening and saw the most incredible, delicate beaded jewelry ever. These tiny tiny glass beads were woven, some on looms, some without, into gorgeous colorful patterns that adorned everything from bracelets to coverings for drums and rattles.

I became totally fixated with learning how to bead in this style, specifically the Peyote stitch. Within a very short time, I'd amassed a collection of Japanese seed beeds, silk threads and wax. And the tiniest, thinnest needles you ever saw. I pored over issues of Bead & Button magazine and taught myself as much as I could. I knew a lot of my work wasn't so good but I kept going because it was so much more fun to make things then to actually wear them.

But then I got to the point where I started wearing my jewelry and people would stop and ask me where I got my necklace or my bracelet. Pretty soon I was selling stuff off my neck, so to speak. Frankly, it was the activity of creating that I loved, seeing the combinations of colors and the piles of beads made me dizzy.

Enough people finally suggested that I should sell my work, so a friend and I went in together on booth rentals and started doing some local crafts faires. I was pleasantly shocked every time someone whipped out a checkbook and wrote me a check for $100. And then we started taking credit cards and I made even more money. Not enough to live on (I had a full-time job and no interest in making jewelry for a living anyway) but the money sure kept me in more and more beads, and classes with bead artists and a trip to the Portland Bead Show.

After a while, I started getting people photographing my work. Some people said right out loud that they wanted to copy my designs. But the truth is this: for anyone who devotes more than 10 minutes to any form of art, you can't control that stuff. And why should you care? In the big picture, it really doesn't matter. Let them copy your stuff, if they can. Do they have the hours to invest and the actual talent to make something people will be interested in, or take that next step and buy?

I always felt that if someone didn't have an idea of their own, then they could copy mine because, hell, I'm going to come up with new ideas all the time.

It's not like I'm running out of ideas anytime soon.

***

So up top, what you see pictured is the one and only good idea I had last week. In order to take my makeup kit with me to photoshoots, and to have a place to put my camera too, I got the idea to go to the art supply store to see what they might have. Makeup artist cases, even the ones on wheels, are extremely heavy and really take a toll on your hands and wrists. I took my original kit to New York for a job and the lovely Nigerian cab driver asked me if the case was full of gold bars as he tried to heave it into the trunk of his cab. When I told him the case had lipsticks in it (the equivalent of gold bars to a makeup artist), he looked at me like I was kidding him or out of my mind.

And lo and behold, at the art supply store, they make a backpack where the front flap folds down and you can put a whole bunch of brushes in there, and then a big open space for makeup in ziploc bags. There are little pockets on the sides for batteries and business cards, and there's room for a camera as well.

And the best part is that you have your hands free to take photos while you're walking to your next photoshoot.

So I'm a one-stop shop: makeup artist and photographer combined.

So that's my fun and free idea, except the backpack costs $39.95.

Run with it, folks.

Noir Sunday with Red Shoes

Luckily for me, most of today had nothing to do with Football.

There's something so great about living in San Francisco, where you can dress up like whatever you want no matter what day it is and no one will give you a second look. If anything, they'll compliment you ("hey, nice skirt") or just take your photo.

***

Today, me 'n Mr. and Mrs. Red Shoes went to the last (and maybe best) movie of the film noir festival, Sweet Smell of Success.

They're such good sports and embrace a good reason to dress up, just like me.

They were also movie virgins (for this film), meaning that I got to enjoy them enjoying this awesome film for the first time. It was a great audience. Lots of people clapped when certain famous dialogue lines came up.

***

I got to wear some special treasures that belonged to my grandma.

An awesome Lilly Daché hat covered in tiny white flowers.

Her crazy cool sunglasses.

Her little white cotton gloves and her black leather purse.

And the best part was recreating the makeup of the era. I did Joan Fontaine's eyeliner from the movie I saw yesterday, Beyond a Reasonable Doubt, and Virginia Mayo lips. I even threw in a couple of beauty marks.

*sigh*

Tomorrow's gonna be kind of boring by comparison. I want to be a gun moll.

An Excerpt

LIPS

They call it "chemo skin." It's fragile, so soft, almost translucent looking. It has a beautiful but disturbing glow.

The woman perched on the chair before her, wearing an autumnal looking sweater, all cabled and tweedy in shades of oranges and golds, was wearing a matching turban on her head.

The makeup counter at the Stanford store is very close to Stanford Hospital. The woman told her that she was finishing her round of chemotherapy before going back to her hometown. She was staying in a nearby hotel, with her husband.

The thing you learn when being a makeup artist is how to find a commonality with whomever is sitting before you. Aside from the regular or irregular features, the wishes and desires are also what you learn to tune into. Most people will share the same themes with you (I don't know what I'm doing with my makeup, I need a change). But you always can suss out the deeper desires. Some people will break down and tell you after a few minutes, and some might simply break down, crying. It happens. That's why you always have a box of tissues handy. Not just for wiping brushes but for dabbing tears.

The woman in the chair with the heavy sweater and the turban, dressed for autumn in the heat of summer. Her hands were thin and chilled. The skin so fragile, so thin, that barrier between blood and the atmosphere.

She assembles her clean brushes, some q-tips, some cotton, on a clean tissue. The woman before her is tired and quiet, so she starts working without any direction.

The first thing she must do for this sweet, aging face is to give it some hair. The woman has no eyebrows, no eyelashes. They were victims of the cruel chemicals that are trying to kill the cancer cells but with their loss, her face is fading away.

She has learned to master the art of the eyebrow. Shaping its geometry is not easy and takes practice. There is an actual science to it, but this will be the first time she's created something from absolutely nothing. First, to locate the spot where the brow would naturally sit. Then, to skillfully sketch in tiny hairs to create those delicate arches. The trick is to make the sketch marks look like they have dimension. A waxy brow pencil is the first step, but then adding layers of different powders gives the illusion of depth.

Then the lashline. How to make it natural, yet defined, not too overwhelming so that it's apparent there are no lashes there? The thinnest flat brush, wetted and dark with waterproof cake liner in brown, not black. Applied to the inside of the lashline where the hairs would grow. Deft flicks of the brush bring the eye into shape. Then a smudge of shadow, above, blended. The effect is soft. It works.

All this time, the woman is quiet. She seems to be resting, napping. Enjoying. When the woman finally sees herself in the mirror, finished, she sighs. She cannot stop talking about how wonderful she feels with this face on. Both of them look at each other with glistening, teary eyes. The woman adores the lipstick, a glossy sheer warm red with a golden tinge. Simply is crazy for it, she's so thrilled. All her life, she says, she's been searching for the perfect color of lipstick (like so many women) and finally she's found it. An $18 tube of color and shine that's made her feel complete.

The two hug, rejoice for the simple happiness of finding the perfect lipstick. They part with kisses.

The next day, the woman comes back with her receipt and the lipstick in the bag and a stoic attitude. "My husband didn't like the color."

She is floored. All of the happy thoughts of yesterday evaporate instantly. "Then tell him not to wear it." She says it in a joking way but actually she's dead serious. What else can she say? Who gives a flying fuck about what the husband thinks? His wife is dying before his eyes.

Amazing. She's never forgotten that woman, to this day. Her greatest hope is that the woman recovered fully from her cancer, and has left that man in the dust. Perhaps she has a lover now, and eyebrows and eyelashes and a beautiful, perfect shade of lipstick.

***

The above is part of the writing project I mentioned. I'm relieved to know that as I'm getting older, the moments in my life that I thought were disappearing from my memory are still there. They might take a little more digging, but once I start, the scenes are lining up in my mind, one after the other, impatiently waiting to be dusted off and told to someone, to you.

That photo is one I took when I first got the camera, and it makes me happy to realize that I can also reach back into my own cache and find my images that help support what I'm writing now.

It's a good feeling to know that everything you need is right there for you. And thanks to all of you who are already infusing my project with the encouragement and support I need to keep going.

Okay, time to get ready for work.

xoxo

Junkie

"My case is a species of madness, only that it is a derangement of the Volition, and not of the intellectual faculties." ~ Samuel Taylor Coleridge

***

When I sold my kit several years ago, I thought I had closed a chapter in my life. Well, I did. I walked away cold turkey and was glad about it. I was so burned out. I tried to stay away from the stores, the magazines, anywhere I might be tempted to relapse.

Until today, when apparently I'm off the wagon again.

***

This morning on the train into work (at 8:07 am, to be precise), I got a brilliant idea for a writing project, a book. At least, it's a brilliant idea to me. I had the kind of feeling that you get when you have a dream that's so clear and true that it keeps you going all day, like a muse has been whispering in your ear all night and you wake up with all kinds of aha's! and connections in your mind.

I'm not going to say too much yet, because you know how some of these brilliant ideas can be. You pursue them passionately to an unforseen dead end and then when you run out of steam, you realize that your idea wasn't really all that brilliant and you got all excited about nothing special.

So I'll tell you about the details if it looks like there's something to share details about.

***

When you're a makeup artist, you're a technique snob and product junkie, a review hound and an ingredients smartypants. You watch other artists work and appropriate their style, when you see them do something new you haven't tried yourself. You can't really go to school to learn how to be a makeup artist. In theory you can, but in reality, to succeed you need hundreds of hours of practice, on real human faces of every make and model. You pore over printed materials and you can pick up a Glamour magazine or Allure and, without reading the photo credits, you know which makeup artist did the cover model. You don't even care who's on the cover. You go gaga for the technique: if it's good, you go gaga. If there's a perceived flaw or mistake, you rip it up and you and your friends talk about how you could have done it better.

When you're a makeup artist, your kit is your most prized possession and it encompasses your ongoing quest for the Holy Grail. My kit was a classic silver metal train case, five compartments high and lined with black velvet, which doubled as a side table and I used to perch a small lamp on it when I wasn't using it. I needed to wear a wrist brace when transporting it to jobs because it was so heavy. I remember a lovely Nigerian taxi driver helping me at JFK Airport, who asked me if I was carrying bars of gold in the case because it was so heavy. A totally understandable question. When I told him the case was full of lipstick, he started laughing. I don't think he believed me.

When you're working, you try to make connections with account managers so you can get free product and then you never have to buy as much.

But you always end up buying stuff. Every artist says the same thing: Oh, but it's for my kit. If you say it's for your kit, then spending hundreds of dollars on shiny new packaging that's smooth and perfect under your fingertips, and subtle, finely milled powders that feel like silk, and soft sable brush hairs of every shape, and perfect bullets of lipstick full of pigment and sensual emollients, spending that money doesn't hurt so much. Because you're a pro, and you need whatever it is... for your kit. It's for my kit justifies a lot.

The truth is that it's never for the kit. It's for you and you just pretend like it's all business.

***

Pictured above, today's naughty haul at Sephora. Several months ago, I had heard a chorus of angels singing (in my head) when I first realized that now I can get YSL cosmetics there, and now I don't have to deal with the snobby clerks at Bloomingdales. Today's pile of beauty started because I got a gift card from my sister and because people keep asking me why I retired from being a makeup artist and all of a sudden I have a basket of items in my hand and in my head, it's all flowing back in a rush of creativity and memories.

It's for my kit.

***

And then, just to prove that fate or fortune or whatever is truly shining on me and my brilliant idea today, my dearest dutchbaby (who knows exactly what I like) scored a bacon scented, bacon flavored lip balm from... you guessed it, the guys at Baconnaise!


Dutchbaby went to the wonderful Fancy Food Show here in town last week and met the proprietors of Baconnaise and now not only do I have the option of glossing my pout with YSL Rouge Pur no. 134, but I can also make my lips smell like bacon! (This is sounding a wee bit pornographic, I realize that now.)

Dogs and men are going to find me irresistable. And No, this one is not going in my kit.

Tagalicious Redux

Ahhh, the Getting to Know You meme. (Now I have that song playing in my head.)
I've been tagged by Mari at maybeinutah for that meme where you wonder "how much do I divulge without alternately boring or scaring people?"

I think last time I did it, I played it safe. Colored inside the lines.

Now I'm going to blow this meme out of the water. I know you guys can take it.

***

But, like how the accounting and consulting firm Price Waterhouse must explain their practices before the Academy Awards, I must first list the rules of this meme:

1. Link to the person who tagged you. (See, I've done it twice, just to be safe.)
2. Post the rules on your blog. (Here they are.)
3. Write six random things about yourself.
4. Tag six people at the end of your post and link to them.
5. Let each person know they've been tagged and leave a comment on their blog.
6. Let the tagger know when your entry is up.

And with that, here are six random things about me that have nothing to do with the other seven random things I gave you last time. I hope these six things are more randomer and more interesting. If not, you can also read the old list and decide. Then you will have a total of 13 Random Things about me for general educational purposes.

***

1. There are two times in my life when I have won a dollar. One time was when I won the "Bone Bee" in physiology class in 11th grade. It was like a spelling bee, except for that Mr. Church held up pieces of a skeleton and then you had to say what bone it was. So I knew more bones than anyone else in my class, and won a silver dollar. My dad still calls me Bone Girl. (But you know all about my dad now, don't you.)

The other time I won a dollar was when some kids on the block dared me to write the F-word in colored chalk on our driveway. Which I did in big, bold letters. And then immediately afterwards, my dad came home from work and drove right over my word. I got in trouble and had to give the dollar back. (In case you were wondering, this wasn't when I was in the 1th grade.)

2. I have two degrees. Actually one is a degree and one is a piece of paper-- you decide which one is which. One is a Bachelor of Sciences in Industrial Technology. The other one is from beauty school.

I always have to explain the Industrial Technology degree because no one's ever heard of that area of study. I tell people it's like an engineering degree for people who couldn't get into engineering school, or hate math, or both.

I don't have to explain the beauty school stint, except to explain why I went there after I got my four-year degree. And then have to listen to people sing "Beauty School Dropout," from Grease.
I just want you to know that I graduated at the top of my class in BOTH areas of study.

I can tell you about the crystalline structures of certain metals OR do your eyebrows to movie star perfection, depending on my mood.

3. I have only accepted a ride with a total stranger once in my life. But it was in Paris, so to me that doesn't count as dangerous or stupid. Also, he had a Mercedes convertible. (To be fair, so you don't think I'm totally shallow, I accepted the ride before I knew what kind of car he had.)

4. Things that annoy me, in no particular order, are: sappy movies (generally chick flicks but anything that hits you over the head to make you cry or laugh), Great Lash mascara (the biggest beauty marketing fraud foisted upon the mascara buying populace), Julie Andrews (I'm sure she's a very nice lady but I can't stand her films), people who can't write an intelligent sentence but have more money than God, and there's probably more here but this is all I can come up with right now without sounding angry or scary.

5. I read one book at least once a year and have been reading it ever since I was nine years old: A Wrinkle in Time. I am so sad I never met Madeleine L'Engle. I grew up to read her other books, her wonderful journals-- The Crosswicks Journals especially, but A Wrinkle in Time is a book that probably shaped my young personality and imagination more than any other.

6. I am pathologically on time and avoid being late to any event or occasion, not just because I want to get a good seat (if necessary), but also to avoid any chance of an embarassing situation or being rude. However I habitually pay my bills late and never seem to be able to send out a present before an occasion. I say this because I still have Christmas presents sitting here that need to go out. Luckily the people who are receiving these gifts still love me.

And here is a bonus Random Thing: 7. I was once dragged by a horse by my right ankle. Let's just say that the horse and I are no longer on speaking terms.

And with that, I have filled your coffers with Random Things and now pass the torch to Char, mrs. sarah ott, NamasteNancy, Heartbreak Tango, Cynthia/Oasis Writing Link, and Blissfully Unaware Lounge Singer.

Those of you I have not tagged, do not despair. It was either because 1. I think you might have been meme'd out already, or 2. you might be shy. However, if I'm off base on either one of these suppositions, by all means consider yourself tagged and do play along. Just be sure to let me know.

Now I am off to consider breakfast. xoxo

la belle fille encore

Beautiful girl again.

Just too pretty to stop here.

Here is the rest of the shoot.

la belle fille avec l'hirondelle

the beautiful girl with the swallows

she loves birds

pretty as a picture

***
Swallow, swallow, neighbor swallow,
Starting on your autumn flight,
Pause a moment at my window,
Twitter softly your good-night;
For the summer days are over,
All your duties are well done,
And the happy homes you builded
Have grown empty, one by one.
Swallow, swallow, neighbor swallow,
Are you ready for your flight?
Are all the feather cloaks completed?
Are the little caps all right?
Are the young wings strong and steady
For the journey through the sky?
Come again in early spring-time;
And till then, good-by, good-by!

~ Louisa May Alcott, What The Swallows Did