updates

art-a-day will resume by the end of this week
have been slacking with the scanning
bad me

upcoming photo and story projects

"Woman to Woman" sticker download can be found on the sidebar

nothing else to report
but in the meantime, here's a roid-art to take up space

upon a purple sunset. conversation

i am alone

so am i

but you have so many friends around you. you have a lovely man who loves you

but I still feel alone

but you have them. i don’t have anybody. no friends. no lover. no body

i have all of them, but i still feel alone

you have no right to feel alone. you have them

i know. but yes, i feel alone

i am truly alone

me too  

*

once upon a window
he saw a choir of clouds
singing praises over a land
they called him to join them
but alas, he chose to reside in his darkness
behind the glass of the window
never opened
and there he forever stayed

staccatos

picnic/vision boarding spaghetti "everybody dance now" eyelid in the eye, engulfed Tiong Bahru to Tanjong Pagar silent smiles 9-6 seuty gaiman him leaving through my sleeve water day 3: a product of the system shanthini Sugar exploding veins fumbling with the lens erased gangsta songs right art-a-day late. period.

a love letter to Words

dear lover,

i peeled out of sleep in the darkness of this morning with thoughts of you traipsing in my mind, like a mad masters dance, releasing, mocking. my mouth transcribed all the formulations that you conjured in my mind onto paper, onto paper. i smiled. our days together have always brought a smile to my face, an upward bracket that held within it all my joys and dreams. but then i chanced upon the world of facebook and my eyes caught a sight of its reflection. vanity affects all beings. it was a phrase so beautiful i felt smitten by it, and yet, envy churned in me. confetti in my eyes. oh, what a beautiful partnership of words. a picturesque eruption i wished you would have conjured in my mind first. alas, you did not. what a disappointment.

but fear not, for my love for you is unwavering. it is like the calmness of the sea - a single plane of blue, like a blanket rhythmically sending vibrations across the land. waves. a single entity of never-ending pieces. i know that you will soon create voluminous wonders inside my mind, wonders such as the finger pressers of indented paper, the extractor of silent notes, & the seismic scale of ground gazing. i have faith in you, my love. only in you.


Yours truly,
n.

unveiling hybrid realities

so it's been a few days since i last got back from KL, Malaysia. one thing i love about KL is how real it feels. in fact, i have a feeling most if not all cities feel this way, except for Singapore. i don't mean to sound like one of those people who constantly diss Singapore - because i do appreciate a lot of things about this city - but it just feels too contrived, too sanitized. and sometimes, it would be nice to have some dirt lying around. it would give me something else to photograph for a change. but yes, i planned a solo trip to KL so i could get away from it all and just be with myself for a bit. but of course, i've learnt that being alone in a foreign place is actually worst than being alone at home. imagine sitting up in the hotel room late at night, in a queen-sized bed where you only occupy the left side of it, the rest untouched, as P.S. I Love You is playing on Star Movies. you sit there alone with a temperature because you were sick on your way into KL, and your tummy still feels (shitty) weird as you sniff away into tissue after tissue - used for both snot and tears, sometimes at the same time. eew. that movie always gets to me. tear jerker. and falling asleep is never easy because you're a scaredy cat who despite having finished your ghost thesis, is still afraid of ghosts and has an imagination that can summon them anytime. and so, i slept with the lights on. blaring hotel lights. under white covers. alone. not that it's any different at home but something about hotels just make it lonelier. but loneliness is good because it makes you discover things about yourself, things that would otherwise be clouded by the presence of people, work, or trivial distractions, like ice-cream. and these are things that one needs to know, or come to terms with in order to move ahead in life. hence, onward!

book cutting

i found some of my mom's old hardcovers. she didn't want them anymore, and so, i attempted book-cutting. it was fun from start till end, but the 'fun' evolved through different emotions - glee, pain, and even pleasurable pain. it was worth it in the end though. i've made the book into a tree, with a hollow trunk to fill in things with.

the horizon, erased

the horizon, erased. she paces, back and forth. placing feel before feet. stumbling silently.
the horizon, erased. she searches for something else to hold.

mapping constellations in my dreams

girl growing in a tree | 09'

The 4th Affordable Photo Fair

i can't believe i've not written on this.

the photo fair went well. learnt a lot of things. the most important being how i never seem to ask for help whenever i need it. bad habit. ought to be changed. new year resolution. noted. also learnt how to actually talk about my photographs. not an easy thing to do, despite my love for talking. also happy to have met new people and other photographers. had a lovely time talking to dennis about photography as art. but that's a different post altogether. note to self.

also feel blessed by the number of support bras that i have. my friends. they constantly keep me lifted, despite gravity. love them, laces and all.

interesting conversations. categories. commercial photography. fine art. questions. did you go to art school? what's your philosophy? some easy to answer. others, a tad hard to verbally express. that's why i have my photographs, right?

end of the day. got a tad sick. gastric. typical. but had fun and am looking forward to new projects and collaborations. hell yeah!

gut the court jesters

why is the idea of the individual, alone usually depicted as an abnormality? a state of being awaiting some sort of reconciliation, a resolution. an unfinished story. in movies, such characters are introduced as weird and eccentric, and we laugh or sympathize with them. it is depicted as incomplete in its worldly experiences. lulled in a state of void because its private parts have never been touched. the story will then end with it skipping off into a pixelated rainbow with someone it has encountered who completes it. you complete me. what an irritating concept: needing someone to complete your sense of self.

nevermore. nevermore.

it is important to have people in our lives. but people should not complete us. our attitude towards people should be akin to that of ghosts. it's fun (or not) to see them, initially, but then it would be better in the long run to be rid of them. for those we encounter, they impact our lives, experiences, and emotions and in that moment, we change. for those we don't see, we don't. but that doesn't mean that they don't exist. they still do. spirits are everywhere! and we hear about them in stories and accounts by those who do see them. and they might or might not leave any marks in our lives but either way, they're still there. and then there are those who haunt us for long periods of time and perpetually keep us on our toes. and soon we begin to feel comfortable with having them around, no matter how grotesque they are. but soon, they'll leave too. because the dead must live as the dead. because everything is momentary. momentaries. and soon, everybody leaves. and because, perhaps the only resolution in life, is death. and i don't say this in a dark, cynical, and ironical manner, muttering displeasure into fingernails that then claw out mine eyes. rather, it is matter-of-fact, isn't it?

and because people are actually selfish beings and we need to recognize that not necessarily as a bad trait but as a normal one. because each person creates her own needs and wants and for some, these needs and wants do not reside within others. i don't need you. but i love you. this does not make it wrong or pathetic. in fact, if you find yourself constantly needing that someone, or the presence of others in your lives, you're abnormal or probably deformed in some way and should proceed to chew on some bones or flesh to complete your growth process as a human being.

i am reminded again of the novel Veronika Decides to Die. everyone is essentially insane. we fill ourselves up with idiosyncratic jewels that we then conveniently transform into mere stones just because the Grand Narratives deem it so. we cast aside our court jesters, stuff their bells into their mouths and silence them. and we hide. we make ourselves feel weird, alone.

searching for the revolutionary

perhaps it's because i've grown old-er, or because i've studied for too long. 19 years. 19 freaking years, straight! but lately, it feels like every argument i hear is one that i've heard before. ideas that have been argued before. recited. reused. arguments about life, love, religion, philosophies on things, anything and everything. all of it. i know them inside out, back and front. and so, certain discussions feel unnecessary, certain 'intellectual pursuits', boring, certain 'doctrines', irritating. feels like i've reached the top of a plateau, the flat surface that makes it easy to walk on, but isn't challenging at all. after all, we've learnt to walk very early in life. the rest of our lives should be spent on using the art of walking for some other purpose.

something more revolutionary.

the search begins.

something to look out for!

oooh!!

catalog | updated

condoms

it's fun coming up with titles

especially when it's funny

and slightly disturbing to some

some

chand | an engagement

chand from nuruL H. on Vimeo.