some fun

so, this came, indirectly, from mr. ze frank. I'd never heard of the guy before. If you are NOT prancing around a spiffy house resplendent in your slippers, I would recommend #1, #2, #3, #6 and #8, rather than the whole shabang. dylan moran.

here's some scary chocolate cake I made:

glazed like donut. (not enough confectioner's sugar for a proper icing, I learned too late). anyway, it's fairly horrid. It has proved, through the years, that I have a propensity for baking experimentation with hideous outcomes. A tricky science not to be meddled with. Although the gingerbread I made was pretty good...

and aside from all this distraction, I am, in fact, making headway on ideas. pages of brainstorming. a full length bony lil live theatre piece in the works. Street stuff too. a quadrillion odds and ends. nearly to the point of needing to narrow some focus down.
I want to do everything of them.

In the meantime, here is a totally unauthorized sneak peak of a thing for the precious few. Please send along your fourth-grade-book-report style feedback.

Sticks & Boonies

Reporting to you live from the wilderness (sort of). I have a wonderful, small village of a house to pad around in and scheme on my next projects. As of today I've three or four I REALLY wanna do NOW.

I'm weighing my options on a new cheapie mini dv video camera to record my theatrical ruminations. Let me know if y'all have any suggestions.

Below you will find some stills from the video I made for Neptune's 'Grey Shallows' off their forthcoming album. The song is called 'Grey Shallows', I like to call this piece 'Some Crazy Bitch in a Tub'.

Animation and Apples on the Ground

I no longer have steady work as a laundress. Unemployment lasted about 5 days. I'm currently working on an animation project for some folks at Emerson. It's fun to figure out how to make things still look really good within the time that the money allows.

I'm gearing up for my sabbatical {snork}; Where I'll be focusing on some new live pieces and whatever else grabs my fancy. Just got word today I'll be having an interlude during the winter to go up to canada and study clowning. Absolutely Marvelous, I tell you.

I completed the secret project. It was a music video for a song off the yet-to-be-released Neptune album. I will post it as soon as I can but I Do know the album doesn't get released until february.

Also, the horror movie project has been somewhat truncated. We completed two out of about 5-6 days of shooting. So I cut together what we Do have and will be posting that soon as well.

I am composing a song.
Apples on the Ground.
I think it'll probably go platinum.

How to Create Your Own "Zombie Miss South Carolina": Make-up tutorial (sort of)

First: gather costume bits of a fancy gown and long blond wig. Make a sash by painting on 2"+ white ribbon. I made a choker with bits of ribbon and sequins as the neckline (or lack thereof) on my dress was so different from hers.

Then: paint on a base of black and purple. I use this groovy water-based makeup that comes in cakes and has lots of colors. Once all the eyesocket shadows and veins are in place, use a white cake makeup of a different brand and sponge over the dark bits using a round sponge.

After That: Draw on the cheat-sheet info on forearms using black liquid liner or lip liner

And touch up and bring out the eyes and lips with some green twinkly loveliness. Then powder down with a loose translucent powder so you won't rub off all your hardwork on the lining of your coat.

Ultimately: put all the bits together and practice your snarl.
If you need a refresher on your lines go here

Secrety Project

I'm gambling that the person who this is for doesn't read this blog, otherwise we got a gato-afuera-del-balso before it's meant to be.

But it's a video project I'm putting together. I'm editing now. (I dislike editing so I'm starting by just throwing different bits into the timeline and hoping it makes-some-pretty without too much brainstrain from me.) It's somewhat of a gifty-type labor of love. it'll be done soon (hopes). It feels appropriate season-wise.

more soon.

Bony Lil's CREATION screening in Chicago

The folks over at the Chicago Short Film Brigade were kind enough to grant us a spot in their lineup:
October 25th
8:30pm @ the Hideout
Chicago IL

I'm super psyched about this and if you're in the area please do drop by and check it out.

{I mean, like, ten minutes of hand crafted animation in some kooky style you've totally never seen before ever, er whatever}

More informations

Blog Action Day- late....

So I just heard today about the environmental blogging thing that was yesterday. I guess those of us with two or three readers are a bit out of the loop. Coincidentally, I was thinking about posting this idea anyway. So, bully for me.

I've noticed a new tendency in myself which I think may have some basis for other folks as well. I spend periods of time reading magazines, renting movies, reading books, watching videos online (see recommendations below); this is my leisure intake time. Everyone has different ways of passive intake; tv and the ninternets, mostly, I imagine. But, after an amount of time, (all of us have different capacities), we want to DO something. Not just passively intake but express ourselves, somehow. Back in the days of cowboys and indians and hippies and renaissance bards and lonely shepherds, someone might pick up a guitar and sing a song, dance, draw, tell a story. Cool. When I get restless, lately, I've been noticing a new impulse that I have generally not enjoyed in the past; go shopping. Buy something to express yourself, a new piece of clothing, a new something to decorate your home, something to exhibit your taste and stylistic leanings. This from a person who fancies herself someone who has come to terms with her own self-confidence issues, at least in knowing that they will not be altered by buying items. Yet, there is still this idea that consuming is expression. Well, I'm here to rip the curtain aside and tell the world: "Consuming is just more intake". Small shards of self-expression exist in which shade of sweater you pull from the shelf, but that's it. Consumption is not Self-Expression. I think Doing and Making are very important ingredients in good mental health. You will never get that special feeling of accomplishment and connection from buying things.

Put down your wallets! Find another outlet. Remember anything you used to enjoy DOING? MAKING? BUILDING? Take a moment and turn off the tv, the computer, the cellphone, and just think about it. Remember? Great. Now look around and see what you have on hand. Look in the closet. Look in the recycling bin. Limitations are the mother of invention. You could build your very own monster in your basement with just what you have in the house right now. You can make an orchestra out of what you have in the kitchen. You can hatch great new ideas on the back of that junkmail envelope. Fix up your bike and go for a ride. You can put something together and walk outside of your house and meet people eye to eye and share. Remember?


{and if you must buy, go to second hand stores. Was that a nose wrinkle? I found a brand new pair of velveteen gucci pants at a second hand store for ten bucks. so...}

Recommended Movies

ONES I'VE SEEN LATELY...


Bathing Beauty: Esther Williams:
great blistering technicolor, synchronized swimming, incomparable ethel smith cameos, red skelton. I mean, come on furfucksake, yes.

Tekkonkinkreet:
beautifully rendered animation, there are some jaw-dropping moments where certain aspects of life are captured in animated form that you may not have seen before, and some you definitely haven't.

Heima: Sigur Ros:
and I've only seen the trailer, even, and it's so moving, so gorgeous.

Taste of Tea:
By one of the directors of Funky Forest: First Contact. I fucking adore it.

L'Iceberg:
a brilliant film wherein there is not so much dialog but moreso melancholy physical comedy. Fiona Gordon is my new inspiration.

Crappy Phontos & Fashion Week(s) Mop-Up

twilight................................................found in havid squeeah
****************************************************************************************
why I adore galliano......................................new favorite color

aNOTHEr site

new site up now for drawings, now. All the pieces from the show, plus one that was not quite as passably family oriented, are up for perusal and purchase. The show is up for another week.
The store's open 7am-9pm daily, 8-8 sundays. I'll be taking it down on the 7th. Come see.

Thanks to all my peeps who did make it out. You make me feel happy inside.

All the Doings

Come to Jamaica Plain Open Studios this weekend (the 29th & 30th: 11-6pm). Come see all my stuff in the flesh. I'll be hanging around chatting people up about the pieces and showing them the secrets. This here is the one that's sold, so far.




We did our first shoot for the horror movie last weekend. It went splendidly. I didn't get a phonto of it but it was kind of like this.

Sincerist Adulation

I just got told by Marc Jacobs.
Every couple years I wake up just the right side of the bed and see a collection and fucking freak out. (past years it's been Alexander McQueen and John Galliano) This year, Marc Jacobs, unbelievable. It was as though he had read my post at the beginning of fashion week and said "ah ha ha. sit back little lady and prepare for your dome to be blown". And so it was.
So I got all these on style.com. Check out all the stuff I left out too.

Marc Jacobs, you do amazing, important work and I'm thankful for it.

music video

I had a couple things to do with this {the miniature sets and peoples, mostly}. Nose bleed turn around on this one. As time goes on, the videos seem to have increasingly wee budgets and increasingly short time to make'm. Show biz.

Guest posting...

...over at Barnaby's Blog.
totally rip-shit fashion analysis.
{no more barnaby blog. see original posting below...}

Thursday, September 06, 2007
New York Fashion Week Analysis: the 5th
BY ZEA BARKER

Happy to see that a new spring has come and not so much with the multi-colored print trapeze floofy barely-dresses and not-quite-shirts. They had their place but I feel like I need to dilute heavily with some austere jil sander or something.
So good.
So a little more tailoring.

But let's just say right off, we are in dangerous territory with folks snapping back to preppy fascism.
We have no time for that as a people.

I require tailored sophistication with a little bit of fuck-you. I need a spot of rebellion in the fashion world if nowhere else. Keep those navy blazers, nautica, just print a barcode on the lapel and line the inside with shredded water bottles (see fig. 1). Keep with that fairy-goes-to-secretary-school thing, bcbgmaxazria, just accessorize with aluminum spaghetti strainers to keep out the evil surveillance (see fig. 2).
.............fig. 1....................fig.2.....................fig.3...............

I'm relieved we seem to be tending toward a bit more refinement, but where is the unexpected and poignant? That's my general taste in art, though, long beautiful swathes of near perfection and then a bloody tattooed dude standing around with poop on his head. (The Taste of Tea is an incredible film by Katsuhito Ishii, highly fucking recommended)

Can we find a happy medium between barbie-decided-to-pursue-a-career-in-strumpetry and muffy-mind-you-don't-tread-on-the-little-people taxidermy?

Sophistication is the New Punk Rock.

I would applaud vena cava for their honeycomb and beer can prints. nice palette too. A couple missteps here and there but they get the blue ribbon for the 5th.

The Drawings' on the Wall

I just got back from hanging my solo show and gave an actual gasp when I walked in my room and saw all those drawings and frames were gone. empty nest.

The framing process was interesting, as they got under glass I would vacillate between thinking they looked very vulnerable and thinking they looked fancier.

The general themes of my thoughts these days surround the issues of being a solo artist. Probably because I'm encroaching on the difficult, unknown territories of self-promotion, of sending some token of myself off to strangers to be judged and getting little response. When there's others involved, the responsibility can be a bit more dissipated, maybe. Or maybe I'm just wishing I knew how to do it. Best I can tell, sending shit out is not so successful. Sharing the same airspace is. Primarily, I must be patient and persistent. Way too early to get downtrodden.

So come see the show. It'll be up all month. City Feed and Supply is an awesome place to visit regardless; coffees, groceries, yummy sandwiches. It's run by marvy friends of mine and you may even find some hand-made signs by yours truly from my time being on the other side of the register. I will be hanging out in the afternoon during Jamaica Plain Open Studios on the 29th and 30th. Leave feedback in the guest book if I'm not around. And buy one if you want to. I'm open to trade and barter, too.

I'm in Love

...with Cai Guo-Qiang.
it's for real.

I've been watching this series on 21st century art by PBS, art: 21.
It's contemporary artists mostly in their own words. It's very empowering as you can see the range of what "artist" means and how the people who do it feel about doing it, and it fractures the myth that artists do only one kind of thing. The definition is broadened to general curiosity. It's all about observation and asking questions rather than a definitive synthesis of meaning. It's rather like a junior high school science project where each person makes their own rules for the scientific method.

Here is a short list of contemporary visual artists that interest me:
cai guo-qiang so dreamy
kara walker
sally mann
tom friedman
barnaby beese whitfield
oh and arthur ganson
{in making that list, it was hard to keep to living people and folks who primarily do gallery work. I think that's why it's so short. rules.}

Solo Gallery Show

GROUNDBREAKING NEW DRAWINGS BY ZEA BARKER
September 4th - October 4th
c i t y f e e d a n d s u p p l y
66A Boylston Street, Jamaica Plain
one block north of the Stony Brook T
and for Jamaica Plain Open Studios
September 29th and 30th

So I've been sitting on this new technique for a year and am psyched to be able to premiere it at my favorite (and most frequented) gallery. Stop by any day and see'm. They'll be available for purchase too. (gotta go out and buy some red dot stickers...)


Also...

some stirrings moving in the direction of a new movie piece. I will say only that it may be in our best interest to buy stock in heinz. (bwah haha)

Shiny and New

I revamped the lil half of the website (the Zea side too a month ago, if you weren't hip to it).

Also, I've been asked to join another video site formerly called Grouper.com, now called Crackle. The carrot on the end of the string being they are partnered with Sony Pictures. I cut a new Distraction trailer for the occasion. Creation one is done too. Check it out.

Also, also, the unveiling of my new drawings in my solo show will be the wee days of September. I will let yous know more as it gets closer. But, it's fun to frame stuff up pretty.

Chicago: Show and Tell

So this one is a love story about me and the el. About two stories up is an ideal height to view a city from. I've had dreams like that.





Especially when the buildings are as pretty as the public library is.







Here is what it looks like when I get shown up in the 1"scale room category. Although, they had a team of folks and I bet they had more than 1.25 days per room.




Here is what it looks like when I get shown up by a tiger. The bear in my first animation piece, Popsicle, just made circles endlessly. THIS cat was rocking the infinity symbol. Deep motherfucker.


This a tiny cave filled with wrathing naked mole rats of all sizes.