Up the Leg Gladiator Sandal

Is it bad that I am strangely attracted to these Givenchy gladiator stilettos?

Jackson Pollock

I can't say that I have always been a fan of Jackson Pollock and the abstract expressionism movement. However, lately I have started to be able to appreciate these paintings that many people feel "anyone could do" more and more. Today we watched this clip of Jackson Pollock painting in class and it really gave me a much better sense of the idea behind this type of artwork. My favorite thing that he says is, "I want to express my feelings rather than illustrate them". And while many people could do drip paintings, any different person who did it would have an entirely different outcome... and that is what is really great about it.

Just get me a really big closet

May 30th needs to hurry up! I am SO anxious for the Sex & the City movie that I find myself watching (and crying at) the trailer every day. I have been trying incredibly hard to avoid all of the spoilers that are being posted every two seconds basically everywhere and it is getting hard! I need to see if everyone gets their "fairy tale endings"!

Better To See You With

So I have been totally into the Buddy Holly/Weezer-esque glasses that a lot of people have been wearing, as well as Ray Bans for sunglasses (duh). These Chanel glasses are seriously AMAZING -- mixing the fun, dorky nature of the style with the quilted siding and little Chanel logos to make them very chic. As well as this, the tortoise shell is done really incredibly, and the other color options are fabulous as well. Maybe if I had these I would be compelled to wear my contacts less frequently. Pllleeease, be mine!

Abortion as Art?

Abortion as art.

This is actually very strange. Perhaps as strange as starving a dog for art. People need to learn the difference between PERFORMANCE art, avante-guard, and just simply going too far. It is so obvious that what these "artists" are doing is simply to cause a stir, much in the way the Marcel Duchamp did in 1917 with The Fountain, but I guess in 2008 when so much has been done to shock people in art, these people can't figure out anything more creative to do than fucked up science projects. However, I was interested to read the artist (Aliza Shvarts) explanation of this project:
"For the past year, I performed repeated self-induced miscarriages. I created a group of fabricators from volunteers who submitted to periodic STD screenings and agreed to their complete and permanent anonymity. From the 9th to the 15th day of my menstrual cycle, the fabricators would provide me with sperm samples, which I used to privately self-inseminate. Using a needleless syringe, I would inject the sperm near my cervix within 30 minutes of its collection, so as to insure the possibility of fertilization. On the 28th day of my cycle, I would ingest an abortifacient, after which I would experience cramps and heavy bleeding.

To protect myself and others, only I know the number of fabricators who participated, the frequency and accuracy with which I inseminated and the specific abortifacient I used. Because of these measures of privacy, the piece exists only in its telling. This telling can take textual, visual, spatial, temporal and performative forms — copies of copies of which there is no original.

This piece — in its textual and sculptural forms — is meant to call into question the relationship between form and function as they converge on the body. The artwork exists as the verbal narrative you see above, as an installation that will take place in Green Hall, as a time-based performance, as a independent concept, as a myth and as a public discourse.

It creates an ambiguity that isolates the locus of ontology to an act of readership. An intentional ambiguity pervades both the act and the objects I produced in relation to it. The performance exists only as I chose to represent it. For me, the most poignant aspect of this representation — the part most meaningful in terms of its political agenda (and, incidentally, the aspect that has not been discussed thus far) — is the impossibility of accurately identifying the resulting blood. Because the miscarriages coincide with the expected date of menstruation (the 28th day of my cycle), it remains ambiguous whether the there was ever a fertilized ovum or not. The reality of the pregnancy, both for myself and for the audience, is a matter of reading.

This ambivalence makes obvious how the act of identification or naming — the act of ascribing a word to something physical — is at its heart an ideological act, an act that literally has the power to construct bodies. In a sense, the act of conception occurs when the viewer assigns the term “miscarriage” or “period” to that blood.

In some sense, neither term is exactly accurate or inaccurate; the ambiguity is not merely a matter of context, but is embodied in the physicality of the object. This central ambiguity defies a clear definition of the act. The reality of miscarriage is very much a linguistic and political reality, an act of reading constructed by an act of naming — an authorial act.

It is the intention of this piece to destabilize the locus of that authorial act, and in doing so, reclaim it from the heteronormative structures that seek to naturalize it.

As an intervention into our normative understanding of “the real” and its accompanying politics of convention, this performance piece has numerous conceptual goals. The first is to assert that often, normative understandings of biological function are a mythology imposed on form. It is this mythology that creates the sexist, racist, ableist, nationalist and homophobic perspective, distinguishing what body parts are “meant” to do from their physical capability. The myth that a certain set of functions are “natural” (while all the other potential functions are “unnatural”) undermines that sense of capability, confining lifestyle choices to the bounds of normatively defined narratives.

Just as it is a myth that women are “meant” to be feminine and men masculine, that penises and vaginas are “meant” for penetrative heterosexual sex (or that mouths, anuses, breasts, feet or leather, silicone, vinyl, rubber, or metal implements are not “meant” for sex at all), it is a myth that ovaries and a uterus are “meant” to birth a child.

When considering my own bodily form, I recognize its potential as extending beyond its ability to participate in a normative function. While my organs are capable of engaging with the narrative of reproduction — the time-based linkage of discrete events from conception to birth — the realm of capability extends beyond the bounds of that specific narrative chain. These organs can do other things, can have other purposes, and it is the prerogative of every individual to acknowledge and explore this wide realm of capability."



Now both the artist and Yale released statements basically saying it was a hoax but then she rebutted that statement and will not admit if it it was "real" or "fake" because the ambiguity of it is what made it so "great". I am just curious to understand how in her mind the fact that ovaries and a uterus are not intended solely to birth children turns self-induced pregnancies and abortions (real or not) into a work of art.

Burberry Spring/Summer 08

While in general I have really liked and appreciated the direction Christopher Bailey has taken since he has been Burberry's creative director, I really can't get past something lately. That SOMETHING is Agyness Deyn... who I think pretty single handedly ruined Burberry's otherwise fantastic and fun spring/summer 08 ad campaign. While this season's collection is sometimes slightly too embellished, I did really like it. And I totally understand the direction Bailey is trying to continue to take Burberry in, and I even understand the androgenous appeal of the campaign, but I wish just one time Agyness would have closed her mouth during the photoshoots. And I wish that I didn't now feel like that amazing teal trenchcoat belongs on a lanky male with bad eye makeup. I haven't always disliked her so much but ugh I just can't take it anymore... the campaign is *almost* as bad as Balengiaca's with Jennifer Connelly (ew). And to end my rant... she should have stuck with the brunette hair for a little while longer:

Gucci Hysteria Bag

Since I first saw the new Gucci collection I became infatuated with the new Hysteria bags and when I got a chance to see it in real life it was love at first site. Ever since then I find myself looking at pictures of it pretty much every single day online... probably drooling. I love how simple it is yet so posh and feminine because of the gold Gucci medallion as detailing. While many of the colors are very fun and I really enjoy the patent leather ones, the plain black leather one is my absolute favorite... it is just SO classic looking and definitely not be going out of style anytime soon. This bag might just have to be my big purchase of the summer.



Oh, and I must not fail to mention that the ALL of shoes from the collection are absolutelyyyy fabulous! And they basically need to be on my feet at all times.