The Highest Form of Hope

Graphic novels (better known as comic books - but doesn't "graphic novel" sound so much more pro?) seem to be having their day in the sun as of late. It seems like every month there's another superhero-based blockbuster hitting the theaters or another visually overwhelming film whose storyboard was ripped right from the pages of some indy graphic novel. 300, Dark Night, Iron Man, The Incredible Hulk and Persepolis have all enjoyed successes. And why not? Comic books translate so easily into film, and now we have the technology to bring these over-the-top action scenes to life.

I have strange ideas in my head all the time. I have ideas for short stories, movies, plays, children's books, songs, paintings, sculptures, novels and such. God only knows the point of these ideas since 99.9% of them will never be accomplished... And lately I can add "graphic novel" to the list - one loosely based on my life. It's called "The Pastor's Wife". Here's a snippet:


Incidentally this scene is based on a true story - a story that has repeated itself about thirty times over the past seven years!

What? You think the readership would be to small to support such a venture? Sure, it's not the most marketable idea in the world but think of the possibilities! Pastor's Wife teaches unruly grade seven Sunday school class, Pastor's Wife has unfortunate wardrobe malfunction on a Sunday morning, Pastor's Wife discovers she possesses super-human strength...

If you haven't figured out that I'm joking... I'M JOKING!

Though I know there are other "pastor's wives" out there who read this and if any of you have a really good idea for "The Pastor's Wife" graphic novel I may consider drawing it out and posting it! Send me your ideas - "Pastor's Wife" obviously has too much time on her hands!!!

Labels: graphic novels, humor

Wassily Kandinsky - Composition VIII

A blank paper is always intimidating. My materials were laid, my books were open, but the horizon was bleakly empty.

I said a silent prayer, "Please help me speak. Please help me see." I had been praying a lot for an agnostic. I often imagined who was on the other end of this one-way conversation. An old bearded man, a pink vaporous mist, a great churning ocean, my deceased grandmother... did it really matter? I guess it depended on the prayer. I read somewhere that God was an unending song, a complex symphony. I liked that image the best. Anyhow the prayer, no matter what image it was to, focused and calmed me.

Charcoal to paper, I thought of the great song. Kandinsky painted music, it was not outrageous to attempt to draw song. Flowing lines deprecating into smudges, staccato hard edges, and a darkened abstracted shape to give it depth. Time passed quickly and soon every finger tip was black with burned willow stick. I looked at the clock. Nearly noon, and still no one in the stacks.

I propped the heavy paper against a stack of books and walked backwards six steps. I immediately liked it and I felt encouraged. But then another thought... How on earth was I going to tie this to the rest of my series? I couldn't possibly rework the previous drawings. Drawings are different than paintings. You often have just one shot to make it work. For each finished drawing there was hours of sketchbook work, at least ten studies and up to three discarded attempts at the final copy.

As I was considering the possibility of throwing away 6 months of work, the sound of shuffling feet on linoleum urged me back to my seat. I looked over my shoulder to see a slight, bearded man walk down the nearest aisle. He was wearing black from head to toe and there were chalk smudges on his trousers. He looked like faculty. He stopped walking and I quickly turned my head and pretended to be too hard at work to notice him.

He stood there for a long time, and then slowly made his way down the nearest row of books. Just leave already! I thought impatiently. I couldn't possibly work while he was standing there. I felt he was aware that I was aware of him. Maybe he could sense my impatience.


"Hello," said the bearded man. I looked up to see him peering around the end of the bookcase. "What are you drawing?"

Labels: fiction

Here is a taste of Persepolis. The first clip is the movie trailer (the English version - I prefered the French - Iggy Pop was not very convincing as an Iranian revolutionary!), the second is Satrapi's rendition of Eye of the Tiger - one of my favorite scenes in the movie!

Labels: movies

Noah in a happy moment!
Sasha in his glory!
The boys stuck inside yet again!

The past week we were on holiday at my parent's cabin in Shell Lake. The weather was terrible, it rained everyday at some point. I only got one day of tanning in so I'm still as white as ever! The boys had fun - well, I'm not sure about Noah because he's seemed to have hit the terrible twos early. Sasha on the other hand was in his glory! The boat was working and he went for rides or fishing with Paul three times a day. They actually caught quite a few fish... unfortunately Noah wouldn't let me come along. He HATED the boat. Not because he was scared of it or anything, but because he wasn't allowed to drive it! Everyday we try to take him for a ride and everyday I had to haul him (all forty pounds of him) up the hill and back to the cabin while he screamed at the top of his lungs and tried to bite and hit me in his baby rage!

Because of the rain, we watched a lot of movies over the week. A couple were surprisingly good; Death at a Funeral and Persepolis were my favorites. Persepolis was particularly well done - it's an animated film about Iran's recent history as seen through the eyes of the author of the graphic novel by the same name, Marjane Satrapi. The animation is fantastic and the story is deeply moving - a wonderful little movie that you should see if you have the chance. I plan to keep my eyes open for the graphic novel.

Another life-saver for us was the Planet Earth series by BBC. I watched a couple episodes on CBC when they played it a couple years ago. If you haven't seen it yet, you need to go and buy it or borrow it from someone. It was something that we could all enjoy watching together. The cinematography is awesome. There are rarely captured scenes of a fish that only exists in cave waterfalls in two caves in Vietnam, a pride of lions taking down an elephant, great white sharks jumping for seals in slow motion, and a terrifying scene of chimpanzees attacking a rival troupe (if you don't share my irrational fear of chimpanzees, you will after you watch that).

Other than Noah's daily freak outs, it was a good holiday. Sasha cried and cried when it was time to go home. "I wish we could live at the cabin!" he said through sobs and gulps. We have one more week later in August so hopefully the weather cooperates!

Labels: chimpazees, family, movies, summer

A few pictures from KRAZY! - the show JP and I narrowly missed in Vancouver last month.

What a segue!

It's been a few crazy weeks... a roller coaster of emotions! Highs and lows all over the place. I feel a little exhausted - like I want to hang out in my cool basement and eat LIFE cereal (for which I was FLEECED at the co-op) while watching Last Comic Standing - and yes I was doing just that not five minutes ago!

Where to start? Well the month began on a high note with winning the Biggar Art show. A week later I rushed back to Biggar to hastily take pictures so I could send off an application for a Saskatchewan wide show that would tour the province for TWO YEARS! I haven't heard back about that yet, but I'm just excited to have the opportunity to actually apply! The day after this whirlwind road trip, I had a job interview - and a job offer. But I delayed saying yes to this because I had also applied for my dream job and was on the edge of my seat in anticipation. Then I got the phone call - I HAD AN INTERVIEW!! I had an interview for my dream job aaaaaaand....... I didn't get the job. *Sigh* I won't lied, that was a hard one to take. I took a few long brooding walks over the next few days to work it out of the system. Conversations with good friends certainly helped... plus the always extremely biased opinion of my husband helped too - It's nice to know that someone thinks I'm all that! Things are pretty tight here in the teacher market - a lot of great people competing for a very few number of jobs... Maybe my dream job will come along again someday.

So until then, I took a job in the city at Kelsey in the adult ed program. It's a resource position which means I won't have to do a lot of planning. But it also means I need to know all my grade twelve maths and sciences (better start on my Chemistry ASAP - Thanks for nothing Mr. Robertson). If I had a frowny faced emocon I would use it right now. WORST. TEACHER. EVER.

To end the month off Paul and I made our rounds at Hepburn Grad (which is always a roller coaster experience) and the day after we hosted both a soccer wind up and the Hepburn art club art show (not at the same time of course - we had ten minutes in between events) which was very well attended - and of course I'm so proud of my girls!!

So that was June. No deep thoughts, no art criticism, no epiphanies. I'm enjoying what I'm reading but I have very little to say these days (other than to express my rage in Coldplay foiling my summer vacation plans). I guess my brain is already on vacation, so I'd like to go and join it now. Now let's watch some reality TV...

Labels: life in general