Novembers

My Lovely boudoire

View of my newly arranged bachelor pad; living, dining, bedding, dressing... lovely

Living & Dinning for one

Desk and artmaking station (plus workout area thus the yoga mat)

Me receiving my very fancy certificate of participation :D

I feel Royal, oh so Royal, I feel royal, and spoiled, and gay!!!! And I pitty, any one who isn't noble today!

I feel so noble, with my own dressers and all...

I went as a Self Portarit for Halloween. It was actually a really successful costume! LOL!

Me and Silvia

Getting into the Christmas spirit

Hohoho!
Or not so much. I can't belive it's nearly December! It's been the craziest thing, November has seemed to absolutely dissappear at an alarming rate! But, I'm kindof happy to be issueing in the beginning of the christmas season. I think it'll be reallhy interesting to see how Korea does Christmas. Maybe big, maybe small , maybe not at all... we shall see. There have been a couple exciting things happen recently. the most exciting being that I finally managed to find an internet provider -with the help of my co-teachers- that will install internet service in my appartment!!!!!!! Yee Haw! So this is my first official blog entry from my very own appartment. It feels great! I feel soo much more on top of things and in control of information! yar! I think i'll really just end up watching a lot more Youtube and internet TV as an outcome, but at least it will facilitate communication between me and the rest of the world a little bit more, and hey for $20 a month, it's well worth it. I decided to change my furniture around to accommodate the only cable outlet in the appartment. So I changed all my funiture and I think it makes the appartment a lot more functional. I've divided it into seperate areas with my bookcases and the effect is really nice both visually and psychologically. It makes my room area feel more private.
I was so thrilled but slightly pissed when the internet guys showed up 2 hours early!! Come on! I told them to come back on time so that i could get my appartment ready and get dressed at least! Hahaha, they did too. I had to keep calling my co-teacher Seung Eun and have her talk to the installation guy to make him understand where I wanted the internet and no I do not have a TV for them to install cable. But we got there in the end. Thank goodness! I promptly spent the rest of the day online catching up on Youtube videos of this season of So You Think You Can Dance Canada!
Deanna thought that I should have started a blog with my detailed analysis of the competition, but unfortunately CTV does not allow the show to be broadcast outside of Canada and I can only glean soooo much from Youtube vids, but here is my analysis after hammering through as many vids of the competition as I could find.
T.J. won the competition. And I think she was deserving of it because she addapted the best to all theifferent styles of dance although i find that she has some very distrating mannerisms. Jame-Rae was great. She was pretty hot and a great dancer but I think my favorite dancers of the competition were Vincent and Kim. I'm sad that neither of them won, but it is after all a popularity competition because they're eliminated due to votes and not pure tallent or performances. I think Kim was a classy classy chick and dancer and i think she has the looks and the body that could take her far in the industry. (Like Karington from the American show who went on to become a big film star in Fame etc...) Vincent was just gorgeous and I think this will get him a lot of exposure and potential jobs in the ballroom world because you coulod almost see him outdancing and out performing the choreographers in rehersals. Not to mention he's French, charming and hot. Altogether the only things that got me down was that I thought the choreography leaned too far towards the mainstream music video culture and not enough towards pure artistic creation. Although I have to remember that it is a TV show made for a mass audience that is made up of sceaming teen aged girld for the most part. I still like the contemporary numbers the best though, especially when they get really arty and character driven. My favorite performances were Amy and Vincents' piece about psychological abuse and the top 3 girls group routine done to classical music. Both of these pieces gave me chills and I had to watch them a coupple of times. Mia Micheals is a genius and I really enjoy her commentary because she is always straight forward and real. It reminds you that in the real world of the arts criticism is harsh and standards are high and it's certainly not just a popularity contest. The only thing I would criticise is the lack of multicultural numbers (considering it is sytycd canada) and also that there was just sooooo much sex and girations of the hips and so much sex sex sex. I don't think great dancing has to be about sex. I think some of the strongest numbers had nothing to do with boy meets girl and they want to get it off. But that's just my opinion. Anyway, I will definitely be following this show as long as it stays on the air and it makes me want to go out and danse. So there you go Deanna and Manu. That one was for you. LOL!
So last week was the final day of the royal court culture class at the national palace museum. It was faily coll as not only did we get to try on royal garb but we also got an amazingly cool blue velvet ecased certificate to prove that we had sucsessfully attended and passed the course... if it was a courseÉ I think it just certifies that we were there and participated, but it`s still cool because it`s soft and velvet and royal blue! It's freeking fancier than my university deploma!!! oh god Korea is so funny.
So I've finally come to peace with the fact that I've been delt a slightly shitty hand here in terms of my school and my living arrangements and I'm determined to look on the bringht side of life and do the best that i can with what I have. So I have to accept that it will just take me much longer to hget asywhere and that I won't be able to participate in a lot of events because i just can't go and stay for an hour when it takes me over an hour to get there and longer to get back. And I have come to terms with the fact that i am not a party person and I never have been so why the Hell would I start now? I don't enjoy being out all night, getting oissed and being tired and humg over all the next day. Never have, probably never will, so might as well not feel guilty about not getting out there and making happy with all the 22 year olds who have not juust finished a grueling masters. I have had a lot of trouble being angry with myself for not having the energy I did when I was 22. If I think back, my 22nd birthday was spent PARTYING at an underground club in Paris!!!! And yes we did stay out all night and yes I has a lot more energy. And no I do not regret it one bit, but I was at a completely different point in my life then and a lot has changed in the last 3 years. So now I think I need to spend more time finding situations I enjoy and less time feeling guilty about not getting out more in situations that I don't really care to be in anyway. When I think about it, I have done a lot in 3 months, more that I'd expected to actually. It's just that everyone else here is soooooo full of beans that it makes me feel as though I'm sitting still in comparison. And there shall we say is the problem; that of comparison. Just stop.
On the bright and sunny and optimistic side of things I got a new haircut which I really love! It would look best if i bought a staightener and straightened my hair every morning, but lests not kid ourselves on this one, I can't even be bothered to brush my hair most mornings never the less coif it!!!! Next i went and saw the most hilarious, scarry, adorable Chritmas movie tonight. Classic! A Chritmas Carol! The new animated one by Disney. It was actually really good and I laughed out loud a LOT! It was really scarry for a kids movie although it's not the lightest topic i suppose. And finally my artowrk it beginning to take shape, litterally, the boxes are together and they look really cool, not i just have to work on the installation part of it.
Will keep posted. For now, that's all folks!

pikchas

Our fabulous traditional Court Culture Course at the national palace Museum. I learnt how to wite my name in traditional Korean...... always long in any language. I didn't even attempt my last name... hahahahaha

Finally Figuring out How to work AND Play In Seoul

Oh Good Lord! It`s already the nearing the end of November and I find the time passing a lot more quickly than I would have expected. The past coupple of weeks have produced some interesting developments. I`m really glad that I`ve gotten myself involved with the seoul artists collective. After our group meeting, I imediately sensed that I had found a group of individuals who were like minded and had similar ambitions towards their art as me. It`s alwayns nice to find other people who take their work seriously. Exhibiting here will be really great for my CV as well as my confidence I think. I think it will also be good for my psyche because since I`ve been working on my piece over the past coupple of weeks, I`ve felt my mood distinctly shift. I don`t know how to describe it other than I feel I`m being useful or putting my time to good use by being buisy making my art in the evenings. No longer am I feeling bad about being at home rather than getting out every night because I`m at home working on my art. The additional instigation of a fast approaching due date has left me feeling like I`m back in my Studio Arts days where getting the work done and working until it was done for the critique was a way of life. I like the pressure of preparing work for a due date and knowing that what I make will be seen by others. I just hope it works out. The idea with this project is that I`m making a comment on how my understanding and the memories that i have made in Korea have been shaped by my identity as a Canadian. I bring my identity, my education and everything that is entailed along with me whereever I go. I`m playing with photcoppy transfers and photo collage. I like the idea of integrating the text from travel journals with the photos I have taken when visiting these tourist destinations. The personal meets the impersonal. It`s taking on more of an installation quality than I originally expected,and although i have a theme I`m working with, It feels quite liberating to be able to get away from art making on a strictly academic level. I don`t need to justify it as much and i find that I am taking more risks with form and media than I have in the past. There`s also the fact that I can`t really work with my chosen media (oils) while I`m here..... not in my appartment anyway. Anywho, The deadline is just over a week away and I have to admit I`m beginning to feel the pressure a little bit. It will just have to get done and that`s that.
School has been ok. I have been putting in more effort into developing lessons that follow the book but also are a bit more entertaining and enthuse the kids a bit more. Especially the grade 6s. They need to be pulled up by their boot straps. In certain instances Iève startd modifying the book by just skipping the most lame parts, but then my co-teacher brings me back to earth reminding me that I have to cover this material as some parents might ask the kids why they have not filled out allllll the sections of their book and complain to the school about it. ARGH! So creativity is limited, but I havenèt quite given up, yet. My school life is not quite as exciting as I had hoped it might be, but the women are really lovely and Seung Eun and I have been becoming better friends. Two of the ladies in my office are very newly pregnant, so that will be very interesting to watch develop over the coming months. I'm still slightly shocked by the state of womens rights and social expectations towards women here. Being beautiful, Getting married and having a baby still seems to be the golden standard. Maybe I'm fooling myself to believe that it isn't still like this everywhere, but maybe it's more hidden in other parts of the westen world than it is here. Today for example i had said that I wanted to go back on the pill because it had regulated my skin, weight and cycles and they kinda flipped out and were telling me the most rediculous nonsense about myths surrounding birth control and things like tampons and alternatinve methods of womanly care. It moments like this when I feel how open and free we are in Canada. When grown women scream and blush and shy away from the concept of using a tampon because they might have to touch themselves in such primitive parts kinda shock me and freeks me out....... What? The cultural sensitivity kinda trips me out.
I had a serious talk with my co-teachers and my head teacher about the possibility of moving closer to downtown. I mean I don't want to complain, but i really think it was shitty of my school to put me in an appartment so god damn far away from everything and everyone. I'm not complaining about the commute to school. Half an hour is a perfectly reasonable commute, what is unreasonable is the fact that it's half an hour further away from downtown from my already far away school!!!!!!!! If I had to commute even 40 minutes to school from closer to down town it would be fine to me! I wouldn't complain, but at the end of all this it appears that the school has locked me into a 1 year lease in a bad appartment in a dessolate part of town. No one will come and visite me and it really limits my options for going out on weeknights when I know it's going to take me 1 1/2 hours to get there and get back. So after much discussion and parusal of the contract my head teacher informed me that I WOULD be able to move if I absolutely insisted on it, but I had rather not because it will be a very loooong, difficult and exprensive process for me. I will have to pay KRW 300,000.00 roughly CAN$300.00 to my landlord for breaking my contract and requesting alease transfer. Then I will have to find an appartment that will rent me a room without a deposit on a 1 year contract and since I'm only here for 9 more months I'll have to break my contract agin when I leave. In the event that I can actually find an appartment near a subway that will rent to me I will then have to pay them KRW 300,000.00 for another lease transfer form and on top of all that i will have to pay an exorbitant sum of money to have movers move all of the crappy furniture my school bought me from one appartment to the other. Altogehter, shitty and unreasonable, but I would like my school to realise that they put me in a living situation which has made my life that much more difficult and lonely here. Yes, may of them live even further in the sticks than i do, but they also live ther with their families, boyfriends, wives or husbands etc... But I will just have to pretend that I'm one of the West Island kids who go into town on the weekends to party hardy and have to wait till the next morning to take the commuter trains back home. Every outting will have to be planned and scheduled in accordance with train schedules and reasonable amounts of travel time. FRIG!!!!!
Despite all this bullshit I have been making a point to get out and meet new peeps as much as possible. I also joined a Korean Court Culture Class at the Royal National museum at Gyeongbokgung Palace. It has ben really fun and surprisingly hands on. Alice, Jeanie and a coupple other SMOE teachers are also attending, so it has almost become a weekly outing for us the past coupple of weeks. so far we have learnt how to make soap in the form of certain important artifacts... we learned how to write our names on traditional papper with ink and brush (and we got to use the kings' official seal as well), and this last week we also learned how to make bi bim bap! Korean cooking is fairly simple and quite yummy although this one has a LOT of steps to it Sesame, soya sauce, garlic and chili, yup. I guess because it's a dish based on left overs (like sheaperds pie) but when you make it from scratch there are a lot of things to make!!!!!!! I'm going to steal some of Jeanie and alices photos off facebook because I've been desperately bad at taking pictures the past coupple of weeks...... eek.
Well, that's pretty much it. I met a coupple people who went to school in Montreal, so hopefully I'll be able to meet up with them and reminisce a bit..... I find I miss Montreal and everyone there A LOT MORE than I expected to... :(
I expect I'll be quite buisy the next coupple of weeks, it's the end of the school year here so things are getting cranked up into high gear to make sure all the units are covered. Students are in full review mode and exam panic. It could explain why they've been such disinterested shits.... more important things to worry about. hahahaha!
I've found out I'm doing 3 weeks of winter compas this break which leaves me with not that much time off AT ALLLLLLL actually. I don't thinkl I have a full week in over a month of holiday. Suck, but at least I've been assigned the drama and art modules to write lesson plans for and to instruct. Yeeeeeeeeeeehoooooooooooooooooooooooo! Hooray, finally something creative and wide open to teach. YAY! At least that will make the fact that I can't be travelling or on a beach somewhere during that time seem slightly more bearable. LOL! Sigh... More frequent posts to come because I finally found an internet cable company who will install internet in my appartment!!!!!! Most places do not offer service outside of this province..... BECAUSE I DON'T LIVE IN SEOUL, OR EVEN THAT PROVINCE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! But internet at home soooooooooooon! Also paycheque soooooon COSTCO here I come!

the colours of Korea in the Fall

Re-directing my focus

How is it already November 8th? Oh my Lord! Where has the time gone? Not quite up in smoke, but somewhere not quite clearly defined. There have been a coupple interesting developments in my life here recently. I've been coming to the realisation that work is not that enthralling and despite the fact that I'm at work 40 hours a week, I don't feel like I'm doing very much with myself here. I've been trying to think about what it is that I really like to do and what I really want to be doing with all of this extra time. I've also been asking myself why I can't be quite sattisfied with doing nothing. I blame my education for that. i've been having it hammered into me that there is always something to do and that any time spent doing nothing is a real waste of time.
I started to think about what I had told myself I would do after I finished grad school. I had repeatedly told myself that after grad school I would: a) Get a good job, b) Travel and c) work on my art. Well..... I have a job, it's not the best job in the world, but it's a good job at the moment and it will help me move towards better jobs in the future. Maybe I just need to invest more creativity into that job, to make it a little less banal... and well yes, taking the job in itself has included travelling. It hasn't really been a vacation, so to speek, but it has given me the chance to experience life in a new culture and seeing and exploring new things and ways of life. And after all isn't that why we travel in the first place? that and partying.... maybe that's what's been missing from my travelling adventure so far? Not enough alcohol induced crazy nights. LOL! I think I'm going to start putting some money asside each month so that next summer I can go somewhere and lie on a beach and swim to my hearts content as long as I can afford.
And then we come to making art. somehow, it's been really difficult for me to move away from a strictly academic framework and move towards a mindset that will allow me to just creat art for myself or for pleasures sake. It has been a real challeng and also a real pain in the ass. it's something I know I like to do and something that I'm good at, but now that the movivation of school and due dates has been removed, it's become increadibly difficult to find the motivation to sit down and actually do the work. I guess you could say that like many people I work best under pressure, so i needed to find a situation that put some pressure back into my life. I began looking aroun and i found the answer through the seoul Artist Collective on facebook. One of the members; Richard, was looking for artists who were interested in forming and international artists collective and putting on group art exhibitions with a specific theme in seoul. I said I was interested, and before i know it i was attending an information session and a meet and greet with other artists. At the meeting it became clear to me that I had all of the sudden left the real of art student and found my way into the sphere of professional artist. Quite by hazzard really, but there you go. We met at the "Jay Gallery" near Anguk Station in Insa-dong, to discuss putting on an exhibition with the theme "Cultures Connect" from december 2-15th. There were about 15 artist there, plus the gallery owners, from all over the world. that's the idea with this collective. that we represent artist from all over the world who have found themselves in this emerging culture and art scene in Seoul. Seoul is in fact at a point in it's own culture where it must begin to accept more workers from overseas in order to balance it's labor force. Therefore, it will become more multicultural over the next decade, and it is this new move towards multiculturalism which really interested the (leaders) of the group and instigated the creation of the collective. It's all very exciting. It's also a bit heavy in a way. I just want to make art in a community with other sympathetic and like minded people. i don't know if I really want to be part of a group that sees itself as a driving force in the emergence of a new art movement. We'll have to wait and see what happens after our first exhibit! Anyway, I've decided to go for it and have paid the entry fee into the group, for brochures and advertising for the upcoming show. By doing so, I've succeeded in getting myself a spot in the show and also assuring myself at least 1 international exhibition on my artists cv. I think THAT was the deciding point. I think it is time to start thinking on a larger scale. I've already got solo and group shows in Barrie, Toronto and Montreal, now I have to begin making contacts and broadening my CV. with a coupple of international ticks, I'm sure it will look more convincing. I'm a bit bummed that none of my work at the \Youthdale exhibition sold, but at least I've shown my work now at a show funded by the Canadian Council for the Arts. Good start.
For the exhibit I have an idea that I want to work with the theme a little more literally. But i also want to continue with the main theme in my work which is the self, storry-telling and documentation. I am not really set up to paint in my appartment and to be honest, I'm not really interested in putting the time into painting so much at the moment. i find working with acrylics frustrating, and seeing as I'm not going to get a studio here quite yet (may be slightly pre-mature I think ;) ) I'm probably going to work with a mixture of acrylic and dry mediums. i've wanted to do some experimentation with gel medium transfers, so that's the direction I'm going towards. I also had the idea that I wanted to show how my understanding of Korea and Korean culture has come mostly from what I have read in travel books and brochures and then how that has stood in contrast with my lived experinces when i have visited these places. How are our expectations of a place changed when we visite a location, hear, see, taste, smell something with our own eyes and senses as opposed to just reading about it in a book? Anyway, I've been doing some tests and I actually really like working with the photocoppy transfer, there's a lot to play with there. I also like that this has given me an excuse to make art but still within the slightly academic (or theme based mode of artmaking) that i'm used to.
otherwise, my life hasn't been overly exciting. I've been getting to the gym more often and although i still feel desperately out of shape, i do feel slightly more in shape than when I began a month ago. Or maybe that's just wishful thinking? I DO miss swimming!!!!! There are no pools around where i live and the Olympic pool has very restricted swim times for people to come and pay for a swim. It's quite annoying really. Halloween last week was a good time. I managed to make it to my friend Sarah and Jeffs' bithday halloween extravaganza. It was a right 'ol good time. My costume was a real success although i failed to get one good picture1 Darn it! i have to admit i keep carrying around my camera and not getting any good pictures recently. Bad..... need to work on that. this weekend, I made the treck accross town to go to a house party. It was soooooooooooooooooooooooooo far! it took me 2 hours to get there door to door, but I'm glad i went because it was exactly what I needed. I have become really lazy with going out and meeting new people and I can't deny it makes me miss all of my friends in Montreal and just hanging out for a little while. I never considered Montreal a small city, but I guess we were pretty centrally located. i guess it would be the same as me moving to the west island or something. those people have an hour commute downtown as well!!!! So now, back to work and trying to just freeking enjoy myself. Why is that sooooooooooooooooooooooooooo hard!??????