Amour

January 23, 2013
It is hard to think of a less fun movie than "Amour". It had its chuckles here and there, but they were just brief respites from the pain and suffering of the film. In entertainment, one of life's great escapes, we generally choose easy/painless and happy/fun. This seems like a reasonable choice, but misses out on some of humanity's heaviest emotional responses. Without sorrow, would there be joy? As I sat through this film, I was uncomfortable and depressed, but also perfectly aware that I was in the presence of great art. Interestingly, the most profound aspect of the movie…

New Year’s Family

January 4, 2013
Two weeks of Holiday time with friends and family is a perfect end and beginning to the year. We went transatlantic to the tiny village of Sydling St. Nicholas in Dorset, England for the first week to spend time with the wonderful Buckland family. Although it rained every day (we saw the record broken for rainiest year ever in England) we were not deterred from some relaxing and inspiring jaunts into the countryside and seaside as well as some cozy, fireplace warmed evenings with great food and wine. We flew home and spent one night in our Brooklyn bed before…

Triumph and Tragedy

December 15, 2012
Today is my 35th birthday, which is fun. I am living an awesomely fantastic life. I have been surrounded by wonderful and loving people for all of my years and have had unimaginably beautiful experiences and adventures. Today is just one day of 12, 783, but a birthday represents the completion of a larger cycle and is a time to imagine the past and remember the future. I have been so loved in life and I want to give it all back and more. And yet, somebody else can feel so traumatized by life that he would walk into a…

Hurricane Sandy

October 30, 2012
An epic storm blew through the Northeast US yesterday and while I am always skeptical of weather hype, this one seems to have lived up to the billing. Satellite images revealed a hurricane core far bigger than most (making last year's Irene look puny) barreling down on the Eastern seaboard, and the wind began accelerating 24 hours before landfall. Schools were shut down days in advance (and remain closed today and tomorrow) and subways and buses remain out of service, effectively shutting down the entire city. It appears that many subway tunnels were flooded with salt water, which could destroy…

Louis CK

October 30, 2012
Louis CK is good. He makes me laugh and he makes me think. His insights are simple and he communicates our basest human qualities in a way that is so fluid and familiar, I feel like I could be thinking them in my head as he says it. He sees the Essence of Life and presents it as easy and palatable low-brow humor; he is a philosopher masquerading as a jester. Art is a quest for The Truth, and great Art shows us the obvious from a fresh perspective, giving us a novel view of Life. I have enjoyed watching…

Felix Baumgartner

October 22, 2012
When I stumbled onto a live feed of a man in a spacesuit ascending into the stratosphere with a helium balloon, preparing to JUMP OUT, I was terrified. Felix Baumgartner's plan was to break the sound barrier in the thin air 23 miles above the earth and freefall for over four minutes. I felt like I was watching Faces of Death: Live. As he opened the capsule door at 120,000 feet and stood on the edge, I knew this was the most extreme event I had ever witnessed; Mach 1 and spinning wildly it appeared to be the disaster I…

Reality: 14th Street

October 19, 2012
I made my meander on 14th St. from Avenue C to the Hudson, then got back to Union Square before the battery drained completely. Rolling the audiovisual party cart across town while projecting videos of 14th Street onto the sidewalk, buildings and people, it felt good to share my music with the surprised public, who were appreciative of the brief encounter. I'm not quite sure why I felt compelled to join the Art in Odd Places Festival or manifest the project in this way, but I dreamed it up and made it happen. For both artist and audience, it is…

Supergood Reality: 14th Street @AiOP 2012

October 9, 2012
Raquel de Anda makes art happen! When Alaina's college roomie moved to Brooklyn a few months ago, she was immediately integrated in numerous projects and coordinating art of all varieties. One of these is Art in Odd Places, an annual community art festival taking place all along 14th Street in Manhattan for 10 days, so I decided I would perform a sidewalk version of Supergood Reality. Since then, I have been visualizing what it would look like and considering infinite possibilities. Last night, it came alive! My Studio has been untethered! Into a "granny-cart" frame, I loaded a 12V battery,…

Long Trail

September 5, 2012
The Long Trail was the first long-distance hiking trail in the US, running 280 miles through Vermont along the spine of the Green Mountains from Massachusetts to Canada. I have spent time on the trail before doing day hikes, but have always wanted to make an extended adventure of it. So last Thursday, Alaina and I packed our bags and drove up to our established start point near Killington and set out on a five day journey. We have done lots of camping in our day, but most of it has been out of a car without the need to…

Mars!

August 16, 2012
Humans built a machine and sent it to Mars. I am impressed by relatively simple technologies like cars, phones, cameras and computers, all of which have embedded themselves in our lives over the past century. The "Curiosity" rover takes all of these amazing inventions from our planet and brings them to another. The effort and cost is astronomical, but exploring our universe is priceless. We may not discover life on Mars, but we have reached beyond our own mortal, earth-bound lives to expand our celestial consciousness and seek understanding of our greater place in the eternal mystery of our existence.…