Category Archives: School of the Art Institute of Chicago

The Graduate Part II: Acoustic Boogaloo

22 Tuesday May 2012

Posted by in Books, School of the Art Institute of Chicago

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See, it’s not electric because I have no money to pay the electric bill. Get it? Ha ha! Ha…

The faculty of the SAIC writing department got us all graduation gifts! Ain’t it sweet? We definitely didn’t get those in undergrad (though, to be fair, at U-Iowa I think there were about 5,000 students in my graduating class).

My heart threw up when I saw a box full of these outside the administrative director’s office.

Durr, I wonder what it could be?

Yes, obviously it was a book – a spectacularly awesome book! And in the envelope was a nice note from our department head, Sarah Levine.

Squeeee! It’s like Christmas!

That’s Drawing From Life: The Journal as Art, edited by Jennifer New. I doubt there’s any better book you could get for a writer in an art school (except maybe for You’re Broke Because You Want to Be: How to Stop Getting By and Start Getting Ahead by Larry Winget). I can’t wait to read it. And then eat it, because the dust under my empty fridge is becoming a tedious meal.

Algebraic Poetry

08 Thursday Dec 2011

Posted by in AWP, Poetry, School of the Art Institute of Chicago

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Good news all around!

1) My volunteer application was accepted for the AWP (Association of Writers and Writing Programs) Conference and Bookfair this spring in Chicago. There are still time slots open, if you’d like to volunteer.

2) I’m assistant teaching an undergraduate film class at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago this spring. I believe there are still slots open for the class, as well, which is on Latin American film studies. It should be great – I’m looking forward to it in a state of barely-continent excitement.

3) Ham and egg nog season is here! Gift shopping is pretty relaxing in my family, as we’ve made the following rule: You only get a present if you’re not old enough to drink yourself through the holiday. We’ve been doing this for a while now, and it’s gone over rather well.

Can’t be all good news: Rick Santorum said the other day that we should eliminate food stamps because of the obesity epidemic, once again supporting my theory: Rick Santorum Doesn’t Understand How Anything Works.

And, finally, some more selections from my upcoming imaginary collection, tentatively titled, “Poems that Barely Make Sense.”

Closure
L = [P^S x (TxB)] / X
or, L equals P to the power of S, multiplied by T and B, divided by X.
In which:
L = Love
P = Petals of the Heart
S = sickly peeling
T = Tongue, torn out by its Roots
B = Brain, blistered and burning
X = Buried in the Sand at Low Tide

An Exercise in Mathematic Cinema from Carl Sagan’s Poetic Encyclopedia of Pornography
(L+C) x V = (OxS) / P
or, L plus C multiplied by V equals O multiplied by S divided by P.
In which:
L = Lateral Illumination
C = Concentration of Light
V = A certain phallic vegetable
O = Curvature
S = Smoothness
P = Stinky pink fingers

It’s Okay to be a Hypocrite

21 Tuesday Apr 2009

Posted by in School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Scientific American, Scientific American Mind

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I’ve gotten to like this blog thing. It’s like a journal for the things you want to say out loud. But I usually don’t say these things out loud, because I’m not a very impressive figure and people don’t often care about my ideas and/or opinions. A room can get very uncomfortable very fast when you are talking about things that other people clearly don’t care about, but then you can’t stop talking because you feel if you can explain it better, they’ll be interested. And sometimes you feel like there are certain things that must be said.
For example, it’s okay to be a hypocrite, as long as you realize you’re doing it. And just because someone is a hypocrite doesn’t mean you should immediately discount what they say. Scientific American Mind, a magazine by the same people who brought you Scientific American, ran an article in their December 2008 issue called “The Truth About Hypocrisy” by Scott F. Aikin and Robert B. Talisse. One of the points of the article is that hypocrisy is irrelavant, because someone’s actions don’t necessarily affect the truth value of their statements. And this is good news for all of us. It means we can forgive ourselves for not practicing what we preach. It’s unreasonable to expect someone to be an ideal human being, but it’s good for a person to have ideals, even if they can’t live up to them personally. It’s better to be a hypocrite than to have no expectations.
Catharsis. It’s late, and I should probably be sleeping.

Going to Chicago this week for an open house hosted by the SAIC writing program’s graduate department. I am nervous. I don’t know what to wear, either. Something tells me to dress nice, but not too nice. Are jeans too laid back? What about slacks and basketball shoes? Suppressing the urge to try on potential outfits, as this will only cause me more anxiety, but it’s a losing battle. Haven’t been so nervous since I can’t remember when.

Gutterballs

21 Saturday Mar 2009

Posted by in Grandma All, Iowa City, Iowa Writers Workshop, Meredith, New York City, Sam, School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Spring Break, St. Paul, The Big Lebowski, University of Iowa

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Watching The Big Lebowski. I decided to watch it after reading I’m a Lebowski, You’re a Lebowski, which I had to do to cheer myself up after reading about the bombing of Hiroshima for class. I didn’t think I would find a book more depressing than Primo Levi’s Survival in Auschwitz. Then I read Letters from the End of the World: An Eye-Witness Account of the Bombing of Hiroshima. It turns out that things can get even more depressing than an account of someone being systematically dehumanized while being physically, mentally, and emotionally crippled by the intense suffering inflicted upon them by their fellow human beings.

As it happened, I was not accepted into the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, but I’m actually pretty happy with this turn of events. I’m excited for the future. Still haven’t heard from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, from which I’m supposed to get a letter sometime soon. I’m going to be glad when it comes, whether I get in or not. It’s the waiting that kills me. Plus, the program is really unique and innovative, which makes not knowing ten times harder. I could see myself living in the South Loop, going to grad school. And when they called me for my phone interview, it sounded like they thought they were stealing me away from the Worskhop. I just let them keep thinking that.

Woo hoo! SPRING BREAK!! Yeah, I spent it traveling with my parents. I spent St. Patrick’s Day with my parents and grandmother. I was in Spencer on Tuesday afternoon and Wednesday morning, celebrating my grandmother’s 96th birthday. She’s starting to talk more about going into a nursing home. Of course, she wants it to be near Uncle Jim and Aunt Mary. When we got to St. Paul, we spent an evening having dinner with Jim, Mary, and Kate. I told Jim about how Grandma manages to steer the conversation to Jim no matter what we’re talking about. For example: I was telling her about that book I was reading for class, and how horrifying it was to imagine this poor man running around the bombed-out city of Hiroshima, desperately seeking his family, and somehow, we went from talking about that to talking about how Jim spent so much of his free time helping the neighbors out with yard work without being asked. She also mentioned during this trip that Jim was such a perfect son, he never once threw a temper tantrum.
Anyway, we took Grandma to Cindy’s Steakhouse for her birthday dinner, and they brought her a small, yellow cake that was still warm. The whole meal was good, but the cake was especially nice. I think Grandma enjoyed herself, and she got to see a couple of her former students.

Then to St. Paul, where I bonded with my nephew and spent some time with my sister and her husband. Got another great meal from a fancified restaurant. We talked about my possibly staying up there for a while when the new baby comes, helping out a bit and saving money. I thought this might be nice, especially since Sam and I get along so well, and Meredith is able to get so much more done when she runs errands if there is someone else along to keep him occupied. When we went to Lowes on Thursday, she was able to get all of her business done while I took Sammy around the store. He seemed to like it. We looked at all the tools, then he sat in every riding lawn mower there. He calls them tractors. He also wanted to test out all of the bathroom fixtures: toilets, faucets, whathaveyous. It’s pretty easy to keep him entertained. I think we spent at least an hour over a period of three days sitting in their front window looking out at all of the cars passing by on the road. “Big truck!” “Where are the people going?”
Also, he’s scared of the car wash. Interesting.

So, that was spring break. Now I’m back in Iowa City sorting through things that I need to get rid of, being that I know for sure now that I’m not going to be here in the fall. The question is, where am I going? Chicago? St. Paul? New York City? Even Los Angeles is in the running.

For tonight, though, I’m keeping a narrow focus on movies and a Tombstone pizza that is currently cooking in my oven. Perfect, lazy end to a lazy spring break.

Creeping Treefingers

21 Saturday Feb 2009

Posted by in Poetry, Sam Becker Building, School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Snow, University of Iowa

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This is what happens when there’s a snowfall, someone walks through it, and then strong winds blow all the snow away. You kind of get reverse footprints.
Trying to walk my sister’s dog was a challenge. The wind blows the snow so that it collects in waves, and there are patches of bare ground in places, all according to the terrain. Then 25 mph winds blow snow hard in your face. So I was wading through snow drifts, trying not to let the dog pull me over, and I got to thinking about how my sister would have landed in Florida by then.

Poem #3 Remix:
She lives in Beverly Hills when She’s not in the sanitarium. Alcoholic, Unbalanced, Hysterical. There are shots of the real Frances as She is leafing through a photo album. She’s a slightly unhinged medium who has a nervous breakdown and is lobotomized. Zola Realism is Dedicated to surface authenticity that tries to project the illusion of breaking down form and content. After that, there are the first realistic shots of a spacecraft reentry. No actual fires are used, and the craft is almost fully intact, Considering it’s been in the ocean for 38 years. There is canned music and all References to homosexuality are removed. About the first sound stages – dreamy landscapes, romance, pretty people, heroic Television Playhouse and Television Theatre; Three Sisters, Death is a Spanish Dancer, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, where, again, All references to homosexuality have been removed.

Anyway, loving the camera phone is my new thing. Here’s a photo of some graffiti that was spray painted on the Sam Becker Communications Building. I’m not going to argue that something’s not art, but I can say with all confidence that this is some of the crappiest art I’ve ever seen. Someone must have just learned about the avant-garde in their art class. Now they’re brilliant and rebellious. Perhaps they’re the next Andy Warhol, but not as pretty.

Hunter doesn’t sit for just anybody. He loves me because I give him chunks of bone full of marrow.

Twisted

01 Sunday Feb 2009

Posted by in Books, Iowa Writers Workshop, John Steinbeck, Mia Gallagher, School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Super Bowl, the Loop

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Some one has used my debit card to make purchases at Wal-Mart. I have decided to track this person down and make them dead. I am hoping to get this on video tape.

I applied to the last school on my list, the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. They sent me a giant book full of information about the school and the city of Chicago. Now I’m kind of thinking that it wouldn’t be terrible if I wound up going there, though some of the student work they chose to include made me wonder if someone isn’t trying to sabotage the SAIC.
Two of the most awesomest things about Chicago: (1) The Gene Siskel Film Center – brand new, state-of-the art, the book calls it “the most technologically advanced film-viewing facility in the Midwest,” which I have heard repeated elsewhere. The Center shows movies every day of the week and only charges students $4. Plus, it also hosts courses and lectures, and panel discussions with guest directors, artists, and scholars. There is a cafe, but no booze. Anyway, number (2) The Poetry Center of Chicago, which is a non-profit organization that offers readings, workshops, residencies, and arts education. Their goal is to make poetry accessible to the general public, and their past guests include Billy Collins, Allen Ginsberg, Gwendolyn Brooks, and Mary Oliver.
I would probably spend all of my time in these two places. Plus, there’s the Blues Fest, the Irish American Heritage Festival, and Taste of Chicago.
One more thing: a recent exhibit at the Art Institute of Chicago was called, “2001: Building for Space Travel.”
Maybe it would be a bad idea for me to remain in Iowa City, even if I did get into the UI workshop. Twenty-three years old and I haven’t lived outside of Iowa yet – not really. Maybe Chicago is the right place to go. At least I wouldn’t have to worry about missing subzero temperatures and snow inside my shoes.
SAIC is right off Lake Shore, south of Wacker Drive. It’s probably really expensive to live there. Stuido apartments in the South Loops, where the school is located, start at around $1000 per month. Things are looking pretty bleak for me financially – I would have to work my ass off to get enough money together. Right now, all I can think about is how much I’d like to set here all day and read this book by Mia Gallagher that I picked up for on the plane in August. Still haven’t read it. It’s called “Hellfire,” her debut novel. And next to that, “East of Eden,” by Steinbeck. I should probably read that one first.

Today people are watching the Super Bowl. I have hamburger meat, beer, and high pulp orange juice. I am ready. Oddly, I have come to loathe the commercials that play during the Super Bowl. They used to be innovative, but now they just try way too hard. I will be keeping track of the game online.
Also, I am rooting for the Steelers because their defensive coordinator is named Dick LeBeau.