Natural.

Something that never ceases to amaze me is the ability of nature to produce so many beautiful things. Recently I went to the Philadelphia Flower Show and I was astounded by what was able to grow from just three simple things; a seed, soil, and water. I walked into the room at the convention center and the vibrant colors, supple textures, and soft fragrances enveloped me, much to my surprise. I will admit that before I attended the Flower Show I had a rather strong distaste for flowers. I do not usually like the smell of flowers, except for lavender, and I typically find that I enjoy discovering beauty in nontraditional sources. While I was there I was able to see hundreds of elaborate displays by people who turn flowers into an art form, and after having conversations with several of them I have gained a new appreciation for things that are more traditional in their beauty. Like a sculptor with a fresh piece of clay, these artists spend extraordinary amounts of time caring for their living works of art… and perhaps, the creators of these floral displays have an even more unique gift than the sculptor because they have the capacity to work all the while knowing that they have no real control over the outcome. Although the florist plants the seeds, it is up to nature to decide what will become of the creation.

Pope.

How happy is the blameless vestal's lot... The world forgetting, by the world forgot. Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind... Each pray'r accepted, and each wish resign'd.

Light Bulb.

One of the greatest feelings in the world is the feeling that you get when you come up with a really great idea. That first moment when all of your thoughts align and you suddenly come up with something amazing and you can do nothing to stop a little smile from creeping across your face. Speaking as someone who likes to thrive on carrying out these brilliant ideas, the only feeling that can come close to touching that of the initial concept is the satisfaction that you feel after carrying it out.

Since the beginning of this year I have found that I have very little time to do the things that I really enjoy. I have been forced to dedicate my time to school and my job with the little remaining time used to sleep in an attempt to recharge my battery in order to start all over again the next day. But recently, with the last stretch of the school year approaching, I have begun to have more and more time to do things that I find interesting.

There is rarely a moment that the gears in my brain are not churning with ideas for photo shoots, graphics, drawings, etc., and amid my thoughts today my brain stumbled upon an idea for a shoot. Now, this idea is something that I will not disclose here until I complete it… but nevertheless it does not change my excitement. The thought of finally having a new idea for something that I can create that I will actually be proud of.

Now, maybe you’re reading this and know exactly what I’m talking about or maybe you have absolutely no idea… but what are your thoughts on this? What ideas have you had that have excited you?

Three.

Since the beginning of quarter two my readership has increased quite a bit. The beginning of my increased readership seems to have started when I posted the link for my blog on other websites. I have a Facebook, a Tumblr, a Twitter, and a Flickr, and once I put up the like to my Blogger the number of views to my page went up. I also think that views to my blog increased when I went back and tagged all of my posts with key words to make it easier for outside viewers to find it. Something else that I tried was to try to keep to similar subject matters, but I’m not sure how much of an effect that really had.

The most popular post that I’ve written is my post titled Ink that I wrote of February fifth. I think that this was a popular post because of the subject matter and the interests of the people that I know. This was one of the first posts that I wrote after I started putting my Blogger link on Facebook, and the reaction by the people I know was great. I had a good number of my friends tell me that they really enjoyed what I had to say about the subject. I also posted the link of Tumblr where my followers tend to be interested in tattoos also. Impermanence was also a popular post. Though I have a more challenging time pinpointing what made it so. Perhaps it was just luck that people happened to want to read my blog that day, or maybe people were just interested in my stream of consciousness at the time. What I can say for sure though is that my readership went from twenty viewers for the entire month of December to three hundred and ninety five in February.

When looking at the sites that people have linked to my blog from, Facebook is by far the leader. With two hundred and forty eight links from Facebook it is followed by thirty nine direct links to my blog and twenty six from my Tumblr. Something that I’d like to try to improve on is the number of viewers that I can get from searching a key word. So far I’ve only had one that was searched under the key words “Alex Grey ideas”.

This quarter pretty much everything that I tried to do was able to boost my readership. In the future I would like to be able to increase the number of readers that will come back to my blog on a consistent basis that are outside of our school setting. Several of the people that I work with have told me that they come back and read my blog consistently, as so some people from Canada and England, but I’d like to see this number increase in the future. If I had to assign myself a grade for quarter three blogging I would give myself an ‘A’. Not because I just want to have the good grade, but because I think that I deserve it for working to advertise my blog consistently, post on a regular basis, read and comment on the blogs of my classmates, and improve the appearance of my page.

As a writer, I’ve learned that if you know how to write for your target audience that you will be much more successful than if you were to just haphazardly write anything down about a chosen topic. I am rather new to this type of writing so I need to build up my skills at this a little bit. But now that I am aware of this fact I can work of my writing techniques. I’m not sure if I have really noticed a change in my writer’s persona simply because I do not really know what my persona was like before this blogging experience because I didn’t write very much. But I plan to continue using this blog after I leave St. Mark’s, so hopefully I will be able to look back and notice some changes.

Emerson.

Finish each day and be done with it. You have done what you could. Some blunders and absurdities have crept in; forget them as soon as you can. Tomorrow is a new day. You shall begin it serenely and with too high a spirit to be encumbered with your old nonsense.

Purity of Creation.

The University of Delaware was recently fortunate enough to become the new owners of a collection unpublished photographs from the late Andy Warhol. Upon the opening of the university's display of these photos, I found myself being one of a small group of students that were admitted to listen to a lecture regarding the places and events behind them. I found the speaker to be very informative while simultaneously being very enlightening.

The speaker took us around the exhibit and told us pieces of information about each of the photographs and without knowing the speaker not only taught me about the art itself, but also about art in general.

Just as a matter of personal taste, I rather dislike the work of Andy Warhol. I am in no way trying to discredit the art that he has made, but I just don’t find it all that impressive. What does impress me is the fact that Warhol was so amazingly good at conveying his vision. Warhol was an artist in the most pure and fundamental sense of the word. He was a man who possessed great talent and natural ability, but refused to ever compromise his vision in lieu of money. It is clear through the observation of Warhol’s art that at all times he had a clear path in his mind and that he remained steadfast to it regardless of what powerful figure asked him to do otherwise.

It is my belief that in the art world today that there are a great number of people with the gift of artistic abilities that call themselves artists with the sole purpose of reaping a profit from their creations. In my opinion, a true artist is someone who creates what they want to create for no other reason than the fact that they want to see their concept become a reality. Now, I am in no way saying that you have to be poor to be a real artist. I, myself, hope to one day make money from the work that I do… but I can guarantee you that I will never sacrifice my vision in order to do so.

Creation is a gift. Creation is a talent. Creation is pure.

The speaker at the University of Delaware did more than just tell me about the events that inspired a random group of photos. Between the lines of what he was saying he was teaching me the true reason why Warhol is great. Not because he was capable of making art, but because he was a true artist.

Innovators.

One of the main qualities that the world of art possesses that never ceases to amaze me is the fact that no matter how much exposure to it that I receive, I am constantly coming across things that leave me astounded. Today in particular, however, I stumbled upon something that has left me completely stupefied!

After an attempt at going to sleep, which didn’t work out too well, I decided to get online and waste some of my time on Tumblr. Now, for those of you who have an account you know as well as I that Tumblr, though intended to be a blog, has resulted in a forum for people to reblog other people’s random photos. Despite this, there are still gems to be found on this pseudo-blog site… and in this situation I quite literally mean gems.

This photograph is of a little ‘project’ that Hubert Duprat did involving caddis fly larvae. Though Duprat is given credit as the artist for this undeniably gorgeous display of gold and gemstones, I must say that I feel this credit is wrongfully placed. Yes, Duprat should be noted for the idea of seeing what could happen when given the caddis fly an opportunity to show its natural ability, but the credit for the art most certainly belongs to the larvae. The caddis fly is known to incorporate little pieces of whatever it can get its figurative ‘hands’ on when building their cocoons. When Duprat supplied these caddis larvae with precious materials he was merely giving some tiny little artists the supplies that they needed to more blatantly show that their simple natural processes are beautiful.