One Way Ticket: September 2011

Where to start? The school, the people, the art, the city, the food, the landscape, the conversations...so many directions and all of them INCREDIBLE! Seeing as I cannot write every experience that I have had I will just highlight the ones that really stick out in my mind. Ok, first off I love my TA job. I am a TA for the Site Practice class in the Performance Art Department the class 15 students, half of which are international. The professor I work with Maria Gaspar, is a young emerging artist who is widely known in the Chicago art scene. Both of us mesh so well together and I feel like I could talk to her about art for hours on end if I had the opportunity. Her style of teaching is quite similar to mine-kind, gentle, and loving. She really cares about the students and is fluid in her teaching. Every time I go to class I am constantly observing her questions, exercises, tone, and language. Yesterday, was our second day of class and she let me lead an exercise called "me". It is a type of trust activity but, the student responded really well. For the first time in teaching I feel like I am able to articulate what I want to say and the questions come innately. I really feel like this is what I have been looking for my whole life...as cheesy as that may sound. PERFORMANCE ART!!! It is a blend of dance, yoga, movement, conceptual ideas, materials, environment, presence...ah I could go on and on. Bottom line--LOVE!

I have met with my advisor twice and feel like he is a complete genius. He is from the performance department and I connect exceptionally well with him. We meet once a week for an hour and it hardly feels like enough time. I have so many ideas, questions, things I want to discuss...ah the time here is extremely precious. His face is incredibly kind and he slightly reminds me of the Colonel Pickering from My Fair Lady because of his loving and considerate demeanor, perfect match for me. Can't believe I get to work with him and that I found him. There are so many professors to choose from. It is wonderful to bring him performance ideas and have him not think anything is too crazy. He always seems to know exactly what advice to give how to help my visions to become more of what I want. I hope all of this is making sense! Before I came to the school I had this preconceived notion that all of the professors and grad students would be these elitest people that you had to prove yourself to, happily I have found quite the opposite.

This next week I'll be working on some time lapse photography, a couple video pieces, and writing two proposals for a performance show called New Blood that will open in November. We'll see if they like what I have to propose. The school itself is phenomenal. Everyone is brilliant in their fields. When having conversations with people I am amazed at what they know and what artwork they have produced. The resources here are OUT OF THIS WORLD!! High-end video and photo equipment, large studios, multiple wood-shops, metal shop, sewing areas, 3D machines, laser cutters, almost everything you could ever think of! I almost feel like I'm in Baskin Robins and I want to try every flavor but, not just to taste but to really study. It's like the best Christmas present you could receive!

The museum is wowing! I haven't even been able to look through the whole thing yet. I got to eat a candy from one of Felix-Gonzales-Torres pieces! And take a poster from off the stack. While there I started to talk to two older women about what their thoughts were about his work. Enthusiastically they both responded by saying that they absolutely LOVED his work. It made me happy to see such open minds. It's like a dream to just walk from the school right through a door into the museum. I often catch myself thinking, "Is this real life? Is this really the life I GET to lead?" Ah, SOOOOOOOOOOO GOOD!

I enjoy the diversity of people even more than I expected. I love to hear peoples backgrounds and different views. The caliber of work is so different and strong because of these differences. Everyone's perspectives on life are coming through various lenses. Coming from my background it is interesting to see so many young people making choices contrary to the environment that I just came from. The environment of the city is magical to me. Everyday I walk out of the Subway and I can't help but laugh because, it is so cool. Everything I ever wanted it to be. I've been able to navigate quite well and in all honestly, haven't felt a drastic transition. I almost feel like this is where I have always wanted to be. :D We'll see if that changes when the temperature is below 0.

I'm all settled in my apartment and love it! I'll try and take some pics this week to show you all. As for pics for this week I'll post some.
This was my first trip on the train with Rachel Coleman: