New year / posterous

Hello!

I am going to make an effort to blog more this year (perhaps even every day?) but I have elected to migrate to posterous.com for ease of use and general minimalism.

If you would like to follow me there, just visit jeremiahmoon.posterous.com !

Have a splendid year.
Jeremiah

MFA drawings 10/3/10

Hello!

I was sketching things at the Museum of Fine Arts yesterday and thought it might be a nice idea to post my sketches up here on my neglected blog. I'd really like to go back and sketch these same sculptures sometime soon, so perhaps there will be a visible progression as I come to know them more and more. If you're interested, I'd appreciate it if you would click the above image to enlarge it—the compressed preview makes the pencil strokes look inaccurately coarse and gritty.

The first one is "Bust of Jules Dalou" by the incomparable Rodin. In my first attempt (left) I tried to move quickly in order to capture the correct sense of the face but it turned out looking too angry. The second (right) was overall much more accurate. I erred the opposite direction of the first and lost all of the frustration in his face. My main weakness with both of these, I think (but especially the second,) is his brow. The eyes aren't quite right, either.

The second is "Le Printemps" by Jules Desbois. This small head is possibly one of the most superb works of art that I have ever seen: the expression on this girl's face was nearly indescribable, portraying childhood more accurately and more beautifully than anything I can remember. I dare not try and describe it myself, its essence would slip away from my words almost immediately. (I was actually frightened to begin drawing it, since I knew that I could only fall massively short.) That said, I was actually somewhat pleased with the result. The proportions aren't quite right (her features ought to be larger on her face,) and her eyes were not captured well at all (though I will give myself grace in this regard, because the eyes are the most important, most affecting, most true part of this sculpture.)

Thanks for reading (this post is mostly for the Tullises, since we discussed posting pictures on my blog about 6 months ago. Hi Tullises.)

j

A Musing on Nostalgia, Shortly Drifting Toward Thought About Absolution.

"Not so in the old days—
Things were pure, those golden days.
Tomorrow is worst of all: the end is bubbling up
through the cracks in the surface, is it not?
We are hurtling toward self-inflicted doom."

 

Maybe we are just frightened to imagine that perhaps things are just as bad as they've always been and always will be—and this is what we ought to fear: not society's downfall, but its continuation. Not apocalypse, but the endless ebb and flow of a fatally flawed immortal heart.

 

For we expect redemption in the end, do we not? Is it true that humans feel the weight of our folly, and long to have it lifted? All fire is cleansing: If we are to burn, then we shall feel justice—as if this is the punishment for our wrongdoings, and once we have weathered it all will be right as it should be. And, perhaps more selfishly, this fantasy includes the satisfaction of seeing your scorners receive their long-deserved comeuppance.

 

Do we await hellfire and brimstone, ours or other, on this earth in order that we can look away from the fire consuming ourselves?

 

For my part, I dare not wait for destruction on any scale—mine or ours. Neither fire nor water by my own hand will suffice. We cannot save our own souls, that much is certain.

this thought has been parasitically attached to my brain for the last several weeks.

Humanity is intriguing.
I am consistently amazed by how self-entrenched we have, and can, become.

By that, I mean that we are almost entirely absorbed in our own race - not to say that’s a bad thing, of course. People are definitely the most fascinating thing I’ve ever heard of.

But it feels odd to take several steps back. Time passes over our ideas, and either dissipates them or molds them to us.

Ideas, things that are in fashion affect our consciousness and alter the course of our existence. Old ideas lead to new ideas, thoughts lead to other thoughts. New revelations appear, are digested, and become old ideas. These old ideas lead to new sparks, which become old and inspire still more.

Clever phrases become common sayings, which eventually become irremovable tenets of our language. Thoughts pass from conscious to conscious, slightly morphing and always viewed through a different eye.

At this point in time, it seems impossible to make something wholly inspired by, say, nature. The movement of the planets, or the growth of a sapling. Chances are, you can follow the thought to its origin and you will end up at a piece of literature, or a word spoken by a stranger, or something which was, ironically, probably inspired by yet another person.

Are we doomed to be forever expounding on our forefathers' wisdom?

Rorschach

I am way too excited for this Thursday.

poème

I discovered yesterday that attempting to write an original work in my non-native language is fascinating. I think differently in French.

Also, my grammar is probably way off. French speakers, please feel free to correct me.

Deja vu ... not meaningless!

     Ok, I decided that this blog is fine for posting RANDOM, RIDICULOUS, and INANE theories that I come up with.

    So here's number one.

     Deja vu is triggered by a real memory: a memory of a dream that you had previously forgotten. But the dream is the tricky part, because that (whenever you originally had it) was a subconscious glimpse into the future. Perhaps the fabric of space-time DOES fold in on itself occasionally, but we can't perceive it unless we completely lack distractions, i.e. we are sleeping. Then it just happens that we see our future, forget it, then half-remember it when it actually happens to us.

Brilliant? Not at all. And I'm sure that I'm wrong about most of that nonsense. But I thought of it, so you had to suffer through it. (<- brilliant logic)

You may consider your day hereby ENLIGHTENED

j