out here in the perimeter there are no stars

we see the sun through eyes shaded by the perspective of our own perception, filtered rays confirming individual existence within the network of our dreams.

one more week

and the thesis will be over.


"i'm taking back the knowledge...i'm taking back the gentleness...i'm taking back the ritual...i'm givining in to sweetness." - david byrne.

my body hates me

it has been destroyed in the service of my mind that is attempting to finish this thesis. blah. and yuck.

one more to add to the family

of plastic debris hanging out and around my backyard...tucked between a rock and a tuft of green grass was a small bit of blue plastic. seeing this reminded me of the site-specific installation i did last october for an outdoor sculpture show that took place in a park out in baltimore. dubbed "the body dumping ground," this park was really nice to see in the fall since it reminded me of the places i used to run in when i lived in ithaca, ny.

originally i planned to execute a large-scale installation of a piece that involves multiple plastic forks. after touring the park, i changed my mind about what to do; the whole time i was walking through the place, the curator kept talking on and on about past sculptures made for the show. i must have heard andy goldsworthy's name invoked about twenty times. she (the curator) seemed really bent on getting people to do works just like his. having met goldsworthy back in the late nineties when he did some projects in ithaca's gorges at cornell university, i never did get a satisfactory answer about how he views his work in relationship to contemporary ecological issues, and how his work participates in (what i dubbed) "the aesthetics of conservation."

i kept noticing all of the unnatural bits of blue sticking out from the green of the park. after four hours and three bags full, i collected enough blue trash to do the following piece:


Baggage (for Goldsworthy), 2004
Kathryn Cornelius
found trash
(detail)

thinking about it now, i realize the piece i did was in some ways re-examining the idea of the "plastic tactics" group show in baltimore's artscape (for which i did a performance piece). writing this, i am sitting at a coffee table, one that is similar in style to those sold at crate and barrel, the store that sells you not just the table, but also the book to go on it. one of your choices? a nice collection of goldsworthy's ephemeral land art installations, ready-made for your coffee table (another object to move when dusting).

that same piece of plastic is still hanging in the tree

stretched across a few thin branches. it appears to blow in the wind, but is really just pushed around by the rain coming down in all directions, heavy with its own wetness.

tattered. worn. the dirty lucidity of the plastic hangs like a flag, the remainder of a past

marking a history
the sign of

a failed truce.

it's a toxin, not unlike

that of too much alcohol flowing through your veins, but, closer to a burning sort of fiery screach inside your vessels, ripping through and raging at everything and nothing and everything all at once, not unlike the cutting of the throat as flakes of "gold" rip up your tissues when shooting down some goldschlager --- it's that kind of screaming burning in the pit of your stomach and tearing up the rest of your insides...

the anxiety of writing is not unlike that of making art -- if it's an installation, well, you've got the date of the opening set and that is it - if there's no material, there's nothing and you're responsible for it. but with art, it's not the concise execution of thought, it's the "hey, check this out a little, and then check this out -- oh, and while you're at it, what do you think about this?" no. no. no. no. no. art. writing. this kind of thesis writing. not. not. not. the same deal at all.

the toxic anxiety of writing is not unlike the jagged shaking of organs before the start of the race -- there's a similar whole-body sense of --- "we have GOT to get it moving and get ALL of these parts moving all at once, IMMEDIATELY!" but, it's not an, okay, to the lane, to the line, to the gun, to the curve, to the straight-way, to the curve, to the straight-way, to the line again and you're done. no. writing a single sentence takes as long as one 400M dash. writing is racing. writing fucks with your body, your sleep, your sense of time, your consumption of alcohol, your pains in your shoulders, neck, and ass. running does simliar damage, but, again. the end is always so much clearer...

if thesis writing is the culmination, why can't it just be the end?

woof!