Here are some picks from the first days of being in berlin... my street, and my favorite painting in berlin... a Holbein masterpiece.

Aww, me work station. So yep, I am keeping busy. Julie has a studio in the room too, I built her a paper wall separate our creative energies.

Quote of the Day

Hence, more beautiful than me you die, truer than me you die, more real than me

you simulate, and more simulated than me you die....

-Jean Baudrillaurd

A true jerk yes, but also a true poet.

A picture

Here I am in paris in Les Halles.

Flash in the museum

Being at the Louvre for the first time what I was really struck by... besides the amazing selection

of paintings of course... was the sheer number of photographs taken. It seemed like everywhere I went, every painting from a neoclassical masterpiece to of course the da vinci with the sly smile, a person was taking a picture. A picture with flash. That is against the rules, but they seemed to allow it anyways.

Being there for two full days, I began to grow tired a little bit of my own research and began to observe the activity of the tourists. In front of the mona lisa, a horde gathered. It seemed as if she was the greatest star there ever was. I wondered... why did they want a picture. Everyone stood behind velvet curtains ten feet away from a wooden banister, which was five feet in front of six inch bullet proof glass. Behind that was the Mona lisa. Or perhaps a body double, a stand in for the painting.

What was to be gained from photographing this original piece of art? Why did the act of replicating it, moronically with a high tech device seem so important. I assume that they might show their crappy reproduction as indelible proof... I was there, in front of the Mona Lisa. But what a shitty stand in for a unmediated presence. Wouldn't better to just look at the painting, with the fullness of one's body, eye, taking in slowly every sensation so as to recognize the complexity of the composition, color, etc? That you couldn't get close to the painting is besides the point.

The crowd itself was far more interesting to look at then the mona lisa. Camera's in the air, each one an extension of the same desire. The writhing bodies pressed together creating a mass that was one large mob blob. An image perhaps ideal for a contemporary version of a large scale history painting of many interlocking figures. I took a picture of this mob blob... feeling a tap on my shoulder I turn to see a security person telling me "No pictures of the people please". You have got to be kidding me. At this point this crowd is no longer any one person but some abstract form ripe for a social theory essay.

Paris day one a fragment.

Paris for ten days.... that says it all don' it? Or maybe better phrased is

Paris is magic. No... that is not quite it either. I am not a big believer in magic, but Paris has it in spades. The first day I went straight to the d'orsay. A huge line up of hundreds of people?! In october? I was a half hour early. Spending the entire day there, eight hours of note taking and art appreciation, amazing... then I walked out. My brain was frizzled, fried and smelled of onion and garlic.

In this state the best course of action is to time warp into a dimension of pillowy comfort to allow for physical and mental relaxation. Back to reality I walk out of a museum and into another museum... that of the city itself. The river seine, lined with 18th century architectural triumphs and either side. Ahh, the french do pomp with extra pomp sauce.

Over the bridge and through the louvre and into downtown paris. The point in which the magic is overtaken by something more real, and raw.... pure urban energy. People, cars, hustling to get shit done. I love this energy but I think Paris would squeeze me, until I had smoked my lungs to nothingness and went broke from five euro drinks. I am starting feel like this working research trip is going to be very rewarding, but also a lot of work. Keep walking...

keep walking... endless walking. Find the Pho restaurant at the end of the rainbow.

Beginning

I really don't know where to begin. I suppose I shouldn't worry about things too much. All I have to is write, right? I am in Berlin and shit is going to happen... wait can I swear? Shit, I guess I can swear. This is great. Shit Fucker.

Okay, sorry for the weak sauce start, but I promise that this well get better.