I used to stop by a news stand on the corner of Moorpark and Laurel Canyon. The one next to a this Neutra that is for sale. From the street as I would park I would always notice these drawings plastered all over the walls. One day decided to take a look at them. The works consist of various crudely drawn portraits on line paper that are plaster all over the walls in the surrounding area. It's either the work of a crazy madman person, which judging by the line paper and the "venue" in which they are displayed, I am guessing that it is probably the case, or some sort of real "artist" who is displaying his work in a public form, the act being the art. Either way they constantly get torn down and then new ones are put back up again, giving the work a quality unto itself. For me the art of it is people's reaction. Most people pay no mind to the fact that there are these creepy portraits slapped all over the walls and those that do just want to tear them down, which lends a very mysterious quality to the intentions of the individual but also, in my opinion, makes the individual and the act of taking it down part of it's mystique. I don't know who he is or whether he was caught but there has not been any new portraits of late.
8 comments:
Holy god you post a lot in a day.
I was going to comment on your movie choices, and writing style, but it all got deleted through some mishanding of my own.
Anyway, I was going to say that your piece on Academy Awards was almost misleading, because you have no idea from the first couple paragraphs that you are only going to talk about Supporting Actors and Best Director. Your list of 4 movies also has no context, why'd you even list it?
Slow down, scrutinize your writing, make sure it's worth reading. 90% of what I write isn't that funny or entertaining. But mechanically my writing is good because it has a natural flow. People should know what you are going to write about in the first paragraph. All this goes back to English 101, etc, but its definately worth reminding yourself with if you are going to write in any way. Even if it is just a blog, you want to be able to look back and say "well, I did try, it wasn't mindless diarrhea".
I'm not saying my writing is anything special, but I still revise, do drafts, and do my best to make it good. Especially if I'm trying to be humorous.
Anyway, that's just my two cents for a new blogger. I'll get off my soapbox now.
I just decided to get out some stuff to make it something more than one post. As for your critique.
I am reading what you are saying, I'm taking it in but I am not looking to be overly mechanical about it. Most of this stuff is about the journey of finding things, of information, and the tangental nature of thought.
I am writing with those two things in mind (the supporting actor and director topic), and at the end of the article that's what you learn about. As far as I can tell from the reading of it, the context is in there for why I am listing those movies, because it is a weak year and I am displaying them to make a point about the year in general and how that is one of the mitigating factors that goes into my attack, it's not just the media's fault.
Secondly I draft, maybe the issue is the amount of directions I go in a given section, talking about 100 different things. I can see why that gets confusing or difficult to follow to an extent but I am writing it as I read it aloud in my head. I know the rhythms and the pauses and I attempt to to my best to convey that with various forms of punctuation and the form of the writing.
I can only write in this voice as it is how I think and talk. Of course all things benefit from editing and what have you, which I am still doing mind you, but what I am more interested is the stories behind things and the information themseleves, also displaying the photos you see as those are taking by me.
I am not going to try to just write reviews just so people can hear what I think about a given film, there has to be something else behind it and in terms of just writing about Mark Wahlberg, well, it's something that bugs the shit out of me but there are bigger fish to fry, especially in the directors category, so if anything, maybe the title is misleading to an extent but as far as what I can read in the body of the piece I don't see any glarring issues as it leads from one bit of information to the other.
I also don't try to be humorous as humor only happens when it does. The goal here is information and content. Revealing things to others they may not be so savvy or reenforcing some ideas that others may. How is the content?
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I'll give you an example. When you list those 'top four', i want to know, at the very least, the top four for what? Directing? The movies that will nail the most academy awards? I'm guessing the latter, but I had to think about it. I'm not saying your writing shouldn't challenge the reader, but it should probably do so in more interesting ways.
Writing about the tangental nature of thought or with a tangental meandering tends to be boring. I don't know about you, but perhaps only a small, small number of my thoughts in a day are really worthwhile, or new. With that in mind, writing about all your thoughts in a day makes you like every other blog out there. Pointless, boring, and having to sift through the millions of grains of sand to find even the smallest pearl.
The idea is, most of your thoughts are shit. Most writing is shit. Just as many films are shit, and only the ones that are the most heavily scrutinized and artistically trained by the director achieve greatness. Self-fellating writing is the same as the parallel directing style.
I've read stuff by Malcolm Gladwell on his blog that doesn't even approach his novels. Doesn't even hold a candle. I'm guessing, for the most part, it's just a demonstration of his day to day thought through the lens of his professional writing style.
I myself have gone off on a tangent here, but I'll give myself the luxury since I am only commenting...
Only very recently, I've really decided that blogs are almost completely pointless without a specific goal. I'm not sure my blog fits that profile, but I decided a couple years ago that my blog should be worth reading if I look back on it. Will it be some musing on nothing, or will it be at least a rough polish?
I hope thats how Gladwell looks at his writing.
This is an article about an unknown crazy person artist...
"article"
My purpose for the site is not pieces like the one about Oscar nominations. That should be obvious with the rest of the content being specific to things I’ve discovered or came across that are interesting, have their own little stories and photos. That's the point but I am not going to pigeonhole the damn thing either and pieces like the Oscar one will be written.
I am not writing for the sake of writing or jerking off but I personally find this stuff interesting, I still haven't heard any comment about anything other than the context of my top 4 movies of the year and that one post out of many, that by the way stands alone in terms of content on the site thus far, and isn't representative of the rest of what is on here, obviously it’s young and there aren't so many post so it is easy to pick it out of the bunch but that being said, I must admit that I frequently enjoy interesting thoughts and conversation in sharing those thoughts, many of which are engaging and interesting so I don’t share your sentiments on that.
I am taking this as I go and maybe you don't find it interesting, that's expected that a lot of people might not, but the point is representing and writing this for people who might be, or sparking interest in the subjects I represent.
Firstly, I am trying to be the bloging master or attempting a vocation with this. With that in mind, your assertion that bloging is useless without a purpose is one that I whole heartedly agree with. But you reading your blog in hopes of getting something out of it a couple of years from now, isn't a testament to whether or not it's good, interesting, or worth reading. The idea of just reviewing a film you saw this weekend isn't going to connect to anyone other than your known peers because your insights are not going to be as deep or well read as people who literally make a living out of this stuff. Commentary that you can bring or add with is something else but even then. That being said I know more about film than anyone I know, I mean that too, more than anyone I have met. Yet with all the information I know, I still would be ass at writing film reviews because it's not my strong point, writing them is sure (that's arguable to some I imagine) But I know that since this is on the internet and people literally make it their livelihood, it's no longer the place where I know the most or would even compete in terms of reviewing.
That’s where I come to purpose or the goal and where I said above that I agree with you. I don't know if you are just saying it out loud or it just isn't apparent yet but the goal, at least for me in my sort of introduction/mission statement, of the site is to reveal things I find deeply interesting during the act of wandering. Wandering is a cute way of characterizing traveling, vacations, driving around my area, making pilgrimages to places, visiting architectural landmarks and other various things that are of my interest.
When I asked how is the content, I didn't mean pick apart the thing you already did and then repeat what you already said with more words. I was asking how you feel about the other things, the plane crash for instance, did you know about that? That's much more interesting than the light weight article on some Oscar stuff even though I concede it should be judged just the same.
If I was going to self-fellate I wouldn't put it on here, if everyone ends up feeling that way about it then maybe I am not being aware enough of my output but I am doing this because I have specific things I want to share in a fairly specific context.
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