neti time

I guess it was about 8 months ago that I first started to use the neti pot to cleanse/rinse my nasal passages after it was suggested by my acupuncturist. I have been diagnosed in the past as having chronic sinusitis, and I am prone to intense headaches, night sweats and have had multiple sinus infections each year for the past 10. Last fall I had gone to my regular doctor with persistent sinus congestion and pain that was not progressing to any infection nor was it dissipating and draining. My doctor basically told me that because I did not have an infection that she couldn’t do anything for me but she could refer me to an acupuncturist. In addition to the acupuncture he has given me strategies to deal with these chronic problems combining yoga practice, general body awareness and some Ayurveda-esque techniques, specifically the practice of nasal cleansing using the neti pot. I have not had any sinus infections, night sweats or intense, crippling headaches since my first visit.
Now I have reached the point where each morning I look forward to using my neti pot— with all of the pollen in the air my body has begun to sort of crave this ritual cleaning. Oprah recently had a show where a doctor demonstrated the use of the neti pot, which has led to a huge surge in the number of people using them and a shortage of the pots in brick and mortar as well as online stores. If you are curious here is a bunch of people doing it on youtube.

Filed under: backstory, life, personal., random, youtube

wow.

Teagan isn’t feeling well today and is watching the movie Cars for the gazillionth time. So I fired up Virgil, my trusty ibook, and began cruising for new-to-me art sites. In the process of searching I found a lot of great sites (see the del.icio.us links) but I also came across a name that sounded familiar: Tara Donovan. This is some one who graduated CCA+D two years before us and went on to do grad-school at VCU with one of our former professors: Kendall Buster, who’s work is incredible and incidentally she now has a book out on critique. Back to Donovan’s work— it has grown and changed so much from her under-grad thesis exhibition that I saw as a sophmore, and now she is getting amazing solo shows and producing works that are sublime. Finding her work is just another in what is beginning to feel like a string of inspiring moments.

Filed under: art+photography, artsy., backstory, life, personal., pics, portland.

portfolio site

I am putting together an interim portfolio site for my own work, Karen’s work and our collaborative pieces.
Incidentally here is our latest collaboration : suspension of emotions
Any way, it is slowly getting filled out and you can check it out here if you like.

Filed under: art+photography, artsy., backstory, life, personal., pics, sketch

illustrating my daughter’s dreams

I have been a stay-at-home dad for just over a year now and both my daughter and I are loving it. It is by far the most rewarding and difficult thing I have ever done. I am not quite Mr. Mom, but I do do all of the cooking, cleaning, shopping in addition to being a doting father to Teagan. One of the newest additions to my list of things to do, is the creation of a daily ‘Princess Teagina’ story for my daughter, Teagan. Teagina (pronounced Tay-gee-nah) has fantastic and imaginary adventures that are loosely inspired by Teagan’s own daily events, dreams and fantasies. Creating these stories has been a real source of joy for me, watching her eyes light up at key moments in the story, or her continued questions and probing days after the story was told. It has been a way to teach lessons, and encourage her imagination. I’ve been creating these daily adventures for almost 6 weeks now and the other day she began asking what people or places in the story looked like, and asked if we could make her a book (I am also teaching her to read— which has turned out to be a great source of pride and fun for her. Weirdo. So anyway now I am making illustrations for some of the better stories.

for instance: Princess Teagina and her superhero sunday (left) and
Princess Teagina and the forest fairy spring festival (right)

 

Filed under: art+photography, artsy., backstory, family, life, personal., pics, sketch

the first colaborative painting with my wife

This was the first painting that my wife and I colaborated on.
It was 1st featured in the Starbucks sponsered exhibition: Avant Grande— at the Chelsea museum in NYC in may of 2005. It was also featured in the View from inside exhibition at the June Fitzpatrick Gallery here in Portland.

Filed under: art+photography, artsy., backstory, pics, sketch