Oh! Hello, there.

So much has changed since I first started this blog six years ago. Most significant among them is that my relationship to "an investigation of beauty" is so different. Now, when I remember this blog, I wonder who I must have been when I created and loved it so fervently.

In these several years that have passed, the very biggest shift in my life is that I am more deeply involved in the making of art now than I was during the heyday of Hundreds of Ways. This is a really sweet revelation, and upon first reflection I think we might conclude that this Beauty project was a sort of stepping stone to the place where I am now—a place I have wanted to be for so long.

But there's a bit more too.

Now, more comfortably seated at the studio table whirring away a some beloved something or another, I feel a new desire emerging—that of getting to write for a living as well.

Though my priorities look different now, (though I suspect they are just differently expressed in my life these days), this blog is such sweet indication of the fact that I have been writing publicly for some time already.

Amazing. And, frankly, quite a relief.

Thanks to all of you who have quietly been reading these words and considering these thoughts in my absence. I love you. Really. Thank you.

And thanks to Blogger for providing us such enticing blog-traffic infographics to peruse.

It's been a good six years.

More soon.

Love,
Adjua

saw so much GREAT work yesterday

at the armory show 2010 and at lmcc's workspace works-in-progress: open studios i'm buzzing with the possibilities i saw actualized and the ones i am still hopeful for.

by color

source

this is the third instance i've encountered of this system.

seems a very 21st century approach.

opposing evidence?

snowfall

march 3rd, 2010 issue

homepage

forgot i'd made homepage so spare.
gasped in delight as it loaded this morning.
happy.

try it out.

it's pretty neat.

workbench

source

ahhh....

from enticing new tumblr
of minimalist aesthetic

most beautiful thing of the week: digital aggretators

i spent some time with, got to know, and fell swiftly in love with google reader this week and also, consequently, the infinite internet.

(i was, as you might imagine, already host to serious crush on said 'net, but this is a different feeling--deeper, more reverent and likely more lasting.)

since about tuesday night, much of each evening and parts of my days have been spent scanning links and posts for as much information as i could possibly take in about what is possible as of today and what news of clever and/or significant events is circulating.

the best part comes during the day as the things i learned alone at night inform, augment and are further, more tangibly, transmitted by my interactions.

cultural capital is the most fun to spend.

and, too, it feels like starting to stretch my mind, hug-style, around and throughout the whole world.

it feels extraordinary, really

still, like finally getting around to reading some long-beloved novel and then finding, of course, that your very-personal-feeling praise is, for the most part, a sermon to the long-since converted, i am saddled with the silly, silly struggle of wanting to tell you--here on the internet, servicably deep into the 21st century--how cool it is to really, and finally, be hooked into what's happening here.

q: better late than never, eh?
a: well, yes--but just barely.

as there is not much to be done about that particular dilemma at the moment, i will end here tonight and say simply

i am happy to finally be using the internet right. *

* some months ago, i mentioned to DWK that i do not generally lose track of time searching internet's infinite (?) depths, to which he flatly replied, "you're not using it right."

thanks: kcg, jc, ja, ear, dwk, jt

most beautiful thing of the day: peace on the lower east

it has been going this way for me lately: i am removed and aloof (or am performing as such) servicably alive despite a dull ache; then i am brought in against my will and am uncomfortable; then in it and relieved to be so capable; then reflecting, inspired and happy and potent.

this evening walking to the train with friends, we all noticed two men in an argument at the corner of ludlow and rivington and it seemed we would do the usual head shaking and mental well-wishing and continue along. one of us strayed from our pack though and went up to the men to insert herself into the mix. a familiar and toxic, panic and impotence flooded my heart as i saw my radical, queer, feminist, hopeful, small, back-pack-and-glasses-wearing friend dwarfed by the big, dumb agression she wanted to stop. we joined her though asking that she step back, trying to reason her out of her grass-roots vision. she countered that she'd done this before, and that it works really well and feels AMAZING. but, noticing my distress, said she wouldn't this time. by this time the two men had gotten away from us, but in our travels and stops and starts at interrupting them, the louder of the two had noticed us noticing him. heading home all over again we ran into him and ended up hearing what had gone wrong, comiserating, hearing about his writing career and talking a little bit about the american penal system and in general having a pretty lovely chat considering.

and that's where the beauty was today--in the shift made possible by having to get involved. this kind of beauty is getting more and more familiar to me--i am really enjoying the way things have been going for me lately.

most beautiful thing of the day

beyond the deep warmth and companionship from dear friends JSD, EL and DW we have two contenders today. in the transcendence department, we have being slowly but surely descended upon by santas and other sundry be-christmased folk on the train this evening and in the realm of the aesthetic we have brooklyn--the myth, and the meaning.

my santacon experience began sometime friday night when i saw a tweet that said "SantaCon" and thought nothing more of it. then around 4pm a noticed a girl getting book giftwrapped whose cute christmas elf outfit was a bit much for just hipness but not a full on costume either. it finally registered when around 630pm I saw 2 then 5 then 7 then 12 santas and associates converging in soho. and by the time i got on the R train up to astoria, queens, it was clear. santacon was all hurbling and burbling all around me and i had nothing to do but giggled and gape.

favorites:
-Santa Khan, tall and lanky in a long, red regal cape with his name elegantly stitched in and a beautiful mongolian-lookin' crown on his pun-loving head.
-Santa on Stilts...rememeber... R train to Astoria--pretty great.
-Bacon Santa
-Santa whose fake eyebrows were as full and lustrous as his hair and beard (and who also turned out to be my friend EL!...w00t! oh man...you should have seen the santas hoot n holler about that love connection--truly cinematic--flash bulbs, "awww"s from the crowd, heartfelt hugs...the whole deal.
-Regular Santa who decorated the train car in garland and candy canes and gift bows while they rode from prince street to times square.

then there was the very old woman i sat beside through all this who said things like "i guess new york city wasn't loud enough for them" and "i bet they're all from jersey...or maybe pennsylvania" and "if i went to where they lived and made noise like this, i'd get arrested" and finally "well merry christmas, anyway, my dear"

and at the very, very end all the way in queens there was the rambunctious little boy grabbing for candy canes, fairly leaping from subway seat to subway seat and then a bit later the reserved little girl who got up from where she was sitting with her grandma, but didn't go so far she'd get in trouble, and looked pensively and for a long, long time at the decorated train car properly bemused and entranced and wondering.

i'll get into the brooklyn myth another time. tonight, that santa-ed subway ride had it all: the beauty of transformation and chance and semi-earnest, semi-postmodern goofyness swept me up into itself and then faded just as quickly.

transformation is beautiful...however fleeting.

good night, all.

the audacity of supple control

i have never seen ANYONE move like this--stunning.

beautiful anthem

Load the car and write the note.
Grab your bag and grab your coat.
Tell the ones that need to know.
We are headed north.

One foot in and one foot back.
But it don’t pay to live like that.
So I cut the ties and I jumped the track.
For never to return.

Ahh Brooklyn, Brooklyn take me in.
Are you aware the shape I’m in?
My hands they shake, my head it spins.
Ahh Brooklyn, Brooklyn take me in.

When at first I learned to speak.
I used all my words to fight.
With him and her and you and me.
Ahh, but it's just a waste of time.
Yeah it’s such a waste of time.

That woman she’s got eyes that shine.
Like a pair of stolen polished dimes.
She asked to dance I said it’s fine.
I’ll see you in the morning time.
Ahh Brooklyn, Brooklyn take me in.
Are you aware the shape I’m in?
My hands they shake, my head it spins.
Ahh Brooklyn, Brooklyn take me in.

Three words that became hard to say.
I and Love and You.
What you were than I am today.
Look at the things I do.

Ahh Brooklyn, Brooklyn take me in.
Are you aware the shape I’m in?
My hands they shake, my head it spins.
Ahh Brooklyn, Brooklyn take me in.

Ahh Brooklyn, Brooklyn take me in.
Are you aware the shape I’m in?
My hands they shake, my head it spins.
Ahh Brooklyn, Brooklyn take me in.

Dumbed down and numbed by time and age.
Your dreams that catch the world the cage.
The highway sets the traveler's stage.
All exits look the same.

Three words that became hard to say.
I and Love and You.
I and Love and You.
I and Love and You.

finding the party again, two days later

In a basement by the beach, the Friday before Halloween, several young people—ears pummeled, minds stratospheric, hearts open, faces alive—witness a no-shit epic show of talent and power and noise, just below sea level. One of them is dressed as a drawing, and, if you look at her face, you know that she is having the time of her life—that her mind is flashing with thought, her heart is exploding again and again and again and her only concern is that she be able to write about this one day and let people who didn't get to be there know how perfect life felt then...how perfect it is capable of feeling.

And that's what a great party does, you know? At its apex, you question nothing—life's good, you're so fucking lucky and you know it. I'd like to find a way back into that party-brain space because I know Everything in those moments. That's capital-E "everything"—like all there was and ever will be to know. Because often, two days later, rational brain at the wheel, it's hard to get back in there and touch the place where it all once made sense. Hard to say more than “You had to be there,” which I never say because, who needs more exclusion in this world? We should all just become better journalists—relentlessly detailed, sensitive and perceptive with photographic memories and wide open hearts.

I am drunk and high and dancing, dressed as a drawing beside a tall friend in face paint and a cowboy hat. To my right, is a girl dressed as a biker cat—sleek and tough, and electrically blasé. Behind me, a dapper friend and his charming, dancer companion who fits so well into our group it's confusing. The air is packed with sound and joy because before us two young men—one a bear, one a birch—are playing the shit out of an electric guitar and a set of drums. The stage is way too small for them and that is appropriate somehow—a visual clue that what's happening here is more than you usually get. More than should rationally be expected. The pair of faces on these two young musicians is just beautiful—the tension between trust and belief and nerves and grace is more than palpable. It is a feeling that goes right to your heart if your eyes are open wide enough.

The bear's right hand plays at hummingbird speeds with home run power. His face is wet with effort, his eyes--so shut, his mouth roaring, his body believing every moment of this. Behind him, in the forest of Eleanor's construction, the birch drums furiously with an earnestness and devotion that could break your heart if you let it. His face all “I'm not so sure about this” and his hands answering “What are you talking about? Look how easy it is to be amazing!” Together, the bear and the birch—Brendan and Pete—fill their stage with a vision of what it looks like to get to do what you want: it's fucking messy and beautiful and loud and when you strut out into the audience knowing exactly what the hell you did to make life feel so fucking beautiful right now, you can feel that they want to embrace you, but you can feel them hold back because they're not as brave as you...yet.

How many transcendent events are happening in the corners of this city at any given moment--a dizzily impossible question to answer. Still, every now and then you might find yourself in the middle of one, with a friend, or in a crowd or all alone and think “well, at the very least, this is happening to me right now, so let's start the count at one.”

oh, hi

it's been ages and ages since i've written--over a year. somewhere in there i got the idea that this project was all wrong, because i wasn't feeling drawn to beauty--or the search for it--in the same way i used to be.

i think it had something to do with falling in love.

the swooshy, ready-to-get-swept-up-up-up-and-away parts of myself were already so wildly engaged that this project lacked luster. c'est l'amour...

also, my love--he didn't get what i was doing here. or he got it but wished it was something else. i'm not sure.

and, finally, largely because of that relationship, i began to look at the parts of myself i'd been avoiding for so long and the effort of that work--the highs and the lows of it--also overshadowed the place this project had in my heart.

but that's only part of the story.

love, and insecurity and much-needed internal turmoil kept my right brain busy leaving 'ole lefty wondering how to make sense of this divergence. and you know what? i think the little guy did it:

stay tuned for a shift towards transcendence...

Oh...swoon

The scientist does not study nature because it is useful; he studies it because he delights in it, and he delights in it because it is beautiful. If nature were not beautiful, it would not be worth knowing, and if nature were not worth knowing, life would not be worth living. 

-Jules Henri Poincare

Found this gem at the end of a wonderful book called The Prism and the Pendulum: The Ten Most Beautiful Experiments in Science by Robert P. Crease. 

I love, I love, I love this depiction of a scientist's passion: life proved valuable by the beauty of truth and the possibility of its discovery.

image credit: Universite Nancy 2 

A Most Beautiful Song

beauty beauty everywhere! let's all have a drink.

"Though we travel the world over to find the beautiful, we must carry it with us or we find it not."

When I read these words of Emerson I think of how there is beauty everywhere for everyone and that all we need to do is be aware of its presence.

Some questions are: How can we be more aware? Is it the same for everyone? What would be some differences? And precisely what do we gain and experience with this awareness?

citation for arctic image
citation for sunset image

Gregory

I am falling in love, and it is beautiful. 

I have connected to an exquisite soul in a darling man, and it is so so gloriously beautiful to see that the legends of love are true.

The sour fog of crushing and pining and wishing and doubting has cleared, and the words of love songs like these are so astonishingly real I feel they were written for us to sing to each other.

This clarifying quality is typical of certain beautiful, transcendent experiences. Different from those that overwhelm the mind enveloping us in vast, warm oceans of incomprehensible pleasures, these beauties are the sterling deluge of cold water from above that remind us - with physical irrefutability - of every nerve and every cell and every pulse of our being and leave us wondering how we could ever have walked and breathed and loved and learned without remembering at each instant the stuff we and everything are made of.

Without desire the world is beautiful

At the end of August 2002, This American Life did an episode about the effects of testosterone on the human body. In the first act, a man discusses how a medical condition that made his body stop producing testosterone made him see beauty in every single thing in the world.*

Everything that I identify as being me--my ambition, my interest in things, my sense of humor, the inflection in my voice--the quality of my speech even changed in the time that I was without a lot of the hormone. So, yes, the introduction of testosterone returned everything.

There were things that I find offensive about my own personality that were disconnected then, and it was nice to be without them: envy; the desire to judge itself. I approached people with a humility that I had never displayed before.

I grew up in a culture, like all of us, that divides the soul from the body and [says] that that is your singleness; that is your uniqueness; and nothing can touch that. And then I go through this experience where I have small amounts of a bodily chemical removed and then reintroduced, and it changes everything I know as my self; and it violates the sanctity of that understanding--that understanding that who you are exists independent of any other forces in the universe. And that's humbling. And it's terrifying.

When you have no testosterone, you have no desire, and when you have no desire, you don't have any content in your mind. You don't think about anything. ... I was, when I was awake, literally sitting in bed and staring at the wall with neither interest nor disinterest for three, four hours at a time. If you'd had a camera in the room, you would have thought I was comatose. I would go out, I would buy some groceries early in the morning and that would be it. My day had no content. I had no interest in even watching tv much less reading the newspaper or a book. Um, food: I didn't want my food to taste good or interesting, and when you're blessed with that lack of desire, you can eat a loaf of Wonder Bread with mayonnaise, and that will be your day. I only saw my girlfriend on weekends since she was living in New York, and I was living in Philly, so I could get away with it five days at a time. Needless to say, there was absolutely no desire.

People who are deprived of testosterone don't become Spock-like and incredibly rational. They become nonsensical because they're unable to distinguish between what is and isn't interesting and what's worth noting and what isn't.

It's very quiet at 530, 6 in the morning, and I would see a brick in a wall and I would think, "Brick in a wall," and I would see a pigeon, and I would think, "Pigeon." It's the most literal possible understanding of the world.

... Everything I saw I thought, "That is beautiful," which is odd-sounding, I know, because that sounds like the judgment of a person with passion, but it was the exact opposite. It was said--it was thought--and sometimes even said with complete dispassion--with objectivity. And you see, I was looking at absolutely everything--the most mundane sight in the world: a weed the sidewalk, and thinking, "Oh, that's beautiful." The surgery scars on peoples' knees? The bolts in the hubcaps of cars? all of it. It just seemed to have purpose, and I was like "Ah, that's beautiful."

When I think about that...the issue of God comes into the equation for me. In a way, being without testosterone brought me closer to God but not in the afternoon-talk-show sense of being, I don't know, more humane but actually thinking like God. Of course, I don't mean, thinking as God, but I mean thinking like God in an aping, superficial kind of way. He sees things as they really are. He sees you as you really are. I had this omniscient sense, when I was without testosterone, that I was seeing through the skin of things; that I was seeing things as they really were and that the objective conclusion--not the judgmental one but the objective conclusion--was, they are beautiful.

Everything is beautiful, from the bugs, to the cracks in the sidewalk, to the faces of other people, and it was automatic. Perhaps to see things objectively is to see them, all of them, as beautiful, [laughs] but in the most--you have to understand that the thought was expressed in the most flatline, boring way possible, "Oh yeah, that's beautiful, 's beautiful."

You would think that this would be a terrible thing, a terrible state to be in and for most people it is, but it was weirdly pleasant. There is a certain appeal, an impossible appeal, to that Rip Van Winkle existence of being without testosterone. You just have to remember that it doesn't matter if you have nothing if you want nothing. Very tricky to get inside that mindset, in some ways it's difficult for me to even remember it now, but it had its allure.

...all that wanting.

I love that the absence of desire yielded a zen-like understanding that the world is beautiful for this man. With judgment, things just were, and when they just were, they were beautiful.

That bit about seeing like God must is wonderful too. In God's eyes, as we imagine them, he is perfect and creates everything, so it is perfect too. He doesn't doubt his perfection like we do and so, must see the beauty in everything.

Hmmm, but perfection is problematic here. It's not perfection or imperfection that makes something beautiful in this context. It's the fact of its existence without judgment that does. There is so much in this.


*Because this particular program ran on NPR stations as a rerun this past weekend it is available to be heard for free from This American Life's website this week.

For maximum coherence I've edited out the words of Producer Alex Blumberg who conceived the idea for the episode, discovered this man's story in GQ magazine, and conducted the interview from which this passage originated. For the same reason, I've also removed a few of the subject's words as he responds to Alex's questions, as well as a transition spoken by Ira Glass between the prologue and first act of the episode.

I cannot thank Ira and the producers and funders of this program enough for its existence. It has shaped and supported my view of the world and the work I'd like to do here so thoroughly.


img credit: modified version of testosterone image file on wikipedia commons

Dave Strome

I'm cleaning house today, going through old papers at the moment. I just found a little scrap of paper from the night in November 2007 when I was at Freddy's talking to Dave Strome about beauty.

He said, "My experience of beauty in the world is theological as well as physical," then added, "Bach's music is the language of God." I wrote it all down and had some more wine.