white walls

polaroids by carrie gabella, pictures of friends/my dog/joshua tree


screen print poster by rhanimals, tori amos 'boys for pele' poster, lttr "practice more failure" poster, darling beastlettes poster from trailer shoot


emily dickinson postcard, photo by naomi robbins, postcard for 'they really want you,' act up postcard, polaroid of i am shelley duvall painting by momchilov, emily d. bookmark, photo print by susanna troxler, painting by llane, painting of joanna newsom (as a pony) by sleepybowie on etsy, postcard of sweater by jason fritz


3 women poster, fold-out poster for bow wow wow's 'teenage queen' 7", "you are my sister and i love you" linocut print poster by me, torn out picture from a flutterby book, jane eyre poster, 1920s art print poster


pen + ink "slattern" drawing by dame darcy from etsy, photo by brother bramm, photo from emily dickinson's herbarium by annie liebovitz ripped out from an issue of vogue


two old paintings, mood board for dora sharlock (photos/drawings of emily d., bodie, yuba river, meek's cutoff, 1800s ladies, antique fabric from fallen apart 1930s cotton dress)


collage by jody jock, kate bush 'never for ever' poster, prints by mai-thu perret, vicious red relic, love poster by anna joy springer, drawing by rhanimals, kate bush "army dreamers" 7" cover, suddenly, last summer poster, collage by me, glitter-encased photo by brother bramm

vanessa julia lutz

don't look back

"When I fall in love with music, I fall hard and obsessively; for better or worse, the romance of me and the music runs its course as I watch the artist and she simply creates without looking back to see if I'm watching."

niina, i love this quote so much, you are the smartest. readers, let me point you here.

last night i went to see tori amos for the first time in six years. it was my 11th tori show, and i will never let this many years get between me and a tori show again. if you too grew up worshiping at the insane and gorgeous and light-refracting altar of tori, then you know what i mean when i say that my throat and eyes were fat with tears for nearly the whole show, and that those tears were only the minutia of what were some feelings so big they couldn't possibly fit anywhere inside my meager body. when i speak of the generosity of people who makes things and put them out into the world, it is tori who first showed me the vastness and complexity of what that can mean.

"i fear my fear is greater than my strength/but i walk the missionary way"

in love

i received my copies of trollops in love from dancing girl press today! in celebration someone can have one for free. 1st person to comment w/their email gets it. xo

tumble

because i am addicted to tumblr, and because darling beastlettes will be out quite soon, i've made a tumblr for the book here. kate zambreno recently did this for her (amazing) book green girl, so thank you kate, for the idea.

beastlette

beast

shooting the book trailer for darling beastlettes next week! the following will be utilized:

happy birthday sweet emily

good intentions

last night a one minute clip from joanna newsom's "good intentions paving company" video was released, and it made me so happy. i've been sad, for various reasons. sometimes it only takes a little thing to give a tiny spark to your brain.

if you read this blog then you know that i am an ardent joanna newsom fan. i've never written about why- what her music means to me. i've tried, and it is hard. it is so hard to write about what i love, because i always, always feel at a loss. the thing itself seems like the only way to do justice to itself. joanna's music- and i should add, her lyrics, because they are just as important- latch onto my heart so easily and with such precision. i feel so much less lonely, and so hopeful, when i hear her songs. i know this is true for many people, which is why i love the joanna newsom-related tumblrs so much. to do this kind of work with you your creations, to be able to comfort and hold so many people through your art, is astounding. it is so important. it is life-saving. how lucky are we, to have access to it all? i feel so grateful to be alive while she is making music. to get to hear these songs, and see her perform them.

there are many artists who i feel this strongly about, and they make wildly varying kinds of art. i feel passionately thankful for them all. i feel lucky to be alive, with the capacity to love, despite sadness, despite the terribleness in this world.

princess parade

a photo i love from one of my favorite events of 2011 (kate durbin's bad princess poetry walk). here kate, as bad cinderella, paints me (as bad ariel) while i rep emily d. and text.

encylopedia special

the wonderful folks who created encyclopedia are having an amazing special this week: you can purchase volume F-K for only $6! this book is so beautiful, a heavy, fancy tome filled with excellence. (you can donate more than $6 if you'd like/can- and if you can, please do, because it's such a rad & multi-faceted literary project.) the author of my favorite book of 2011, anna joy springer, has several pieces in here, as well as 193 other fabulous contributors. if you were thinking of buying a book for that special reader in your life for the holidays, this is the perfect one.

marry the night

my favorite part is when gaga is in the tub, with her soft singing in the background, dyeing her hair. the urge to make some kind of physical transformation when grieving is one that is so familiar, a real ritual that lives on the surface while also speaking to everything molting beneath. today i re-painted my nails (OPI mermaid's tears on fingers, OPI ate berries in the canaries on toes) & bought hair dye named "electric banana" that will apparently glow under blacklights.

list #2

favorite films of 2011, in no particular order:

jane eyre
meek's cutoff (the list is truly in no particular order, but this is by far my #1 favorite of the year)
the tree of life
bridesmaids
melancholia
my week with marilyn (for m. williams' performance only, the film itself was unremarkable)

and i greatly anticipate young adult, sleeping beauty, and dark horse.

mono lake

a video from a visit to bodie last year; i drove down to mono lake where some seagulls were talking up a storm.

list #1

2011 records of the year, as chosen by me & in no particular order

st. vincent- strange mercy
pj harvey- let england shake
deep teens- tba (busy recording right now so it totally counts)
the antlers- burst apart
beyonce- 4
horses & high heels- marianne faithfull
lady gaga- born this way
kate bush- 50 words for snow
fleet foxes- helplessness blues
joanna newsom- what we have known

now you tell me yours.