AMP: Artists' Meeting Place and Resource Collective

I read the news today that my social security number (SSN), my birth date and school records were probably comprimised when a hacker broke into the UCLA student database. As a socialist it sent me into a mild depression because I feel that the only use I have to the modern proletariat is fodder for monitary scams. The whole "identity theft" problem is so much more than just another thing to be paranoid about. First of all it tells me that Marx was so very wrong - in the purest of capitalist societies, the bourgeois do not take advantage of the proletariat - the proletariat takes advantage of the proletariat. Secondly it is something that signals to me that human beings are being objectified into a set of numbers by other human beings in order to take advange of them. I'm used to being treated like a number though my job, my health care and my insurance. But I had nievely hoped that the "random person on the street" would want to know about me and not about the potential numbers in my bank account. It's tragic but when I die, I will most likely be put into a plot of land that also has a serial number.

I like blueberries. I read in a magazine a long time ago that the reason that Boo-Berry cereal didn't sell well was because humans are instinctually afraid of eating blue objects. Evidently blue objects found in nature are always poisonous with the exception of the blueberry. When I eat blueberries it terrifies me to the soul and thus they are delicious.

It's hard to believe that someone who thinks that Ralph Nader and the Green Party are a little conservative would attend a military event but this Saturday I went to the Joint Service Open House (JSOH) Air Show in Maryland. I’ve always liked air shows ever since I was a kid watching Blue Angels at the El Toro airbase with my dad. Even though the pilots are doing loops and barrel rolls in billion dollar machines built for war and killing, there is something so innocent about it. When I look up to the heavens at the winged bird I realize the magnificence of nature and when I see a jet propelling a man higher than the clouds and faster than sound I am amazed by the progress of modernity and the courage of the human spirit.

I just finished describing my "I [clover] Boston" t-shirt and wondered if I should try and explain the pun on "I [heart] NY" but before I could he replied, "Okay I'll be there in about 45 minutes! See you soon!" Of all the places a person can wait, the bookstore is just about ideal - one who cannot pass 45 minutes thumbing though books is not truly living. It was a little cold inside the store and I decided to don my OCC sweater and keep an eye out for an older person with the National's baseball cap. Surely enough, once I started reading those 45 minutes vanished from the face of the earth until an older person with a National's baseball cap was standing at the entrance.

I have three goals.

1) Learn a foreign language to fluency (Japanese)
2) Learn to play a musical instrument (piano)
3) Learn to cook (Japanese/Italian)

Love. Friends. Happiness. All unecessary. All unwanted.

To escape the horrible food of the cafeteria I decided to flee my building and retreat to the slighly less horrible food of Subway. As soon as I walked outside I was reminded how fast spring weather in Washington D.C. can change - during the course of the day the sun had warmed up the weather so that only a cool breeze was evidence of the cold and brisk morning. Outside the trees that were so barren just a couple of months ealier had come to life. If I closed my eyes and let my mind wander, I could remember the branches when they were saturated with flowers that were so pink and so red that only poets could emblish their beauty properly.

I think cities are intrinsically beautiful because they are formed though contradicting energies that are in both conflict and in harmony with each other. The more chaotic and unplanned a city is, the more beautiful and spontaneous it can be. People have criticized Los Angeles for being soulless and superficial but as a photographer I think Los Angeles has one of the world’s most beautiful and defined skylines - it is a towering homage to glass, steel and money amid a flat sea of dull and dreary suburban housing. When I look out at the city from the Getty Center at night, I am amazed that

Today on the front of this site I saw a message from a member who wants to collect black and white photos to sell to a client. People have often asked me if I've ever considered a career in photography. I think most people think of photographers as people who take photos on top of mountains and live as free and unchained as the wind that rustles though their hair. The reality of it is, people who make a living off of photography spend more time editing their photos, making phone calls and meeitng up with clients than they actually do taking photos. Futhermore, walking around all day carrying heavy and bulky professional equiptment makes taking photos more of a burden than anything else.

For this AMP site, I listed my type of art as photography although I personally feel that photography is not art. To me art is something that comes from the soul and is expressed in a physical form - it is something unseen which comes from the artist's mind. Photography is more like expressionism - one can only photograph what exists in real life but the perspective that the photographer gives it is his/her own. It's much like playing the piano well - the music is already written on the sheet, but it is up to the pianist to determine how it will sound to others. Honestly, I orignially got into photography because I loved the sound of the whir and click of a camera in a MISIA song I was listening to.

I plan to use this as an artistic photo diary of sorts - I am going to post a photo that I have taken and then give a short comment about it. It may or may not be related to the photo at all, and in fact may be my own way of voicing issues in my life, but let's see how far this will take me. Tomorrow I'll start!