Archive for March, 2008

working portrait, water girl

David and I have been working on a new portrait together. I love collaborating with David because he has strengths that I could never posses, and with our powers combined, we are Captain Planet! Or just really freakin’ awesome at arting. I have been sketching in my new moleskin book recently and I’ll be posting more artwork to bypass my bloggers-block.

By the way, those of you who wanted to participate in my scuba bee contest, you are breaking my heart. I’ll keep the contest going for a while longer to give you guys time, how about a month. I would really love to give my old paintings away, they do no good gathering dust in my garage.

Now for some art: My initial sketch for the portrait.

David’s perfect interpretation of my sketch into a flawless line drawing.

My coloring work, this is the part of a painting that makes my heart swell and sets everything right in the world.

hands bees and cats

Three coincidences:

• David and I love talking about religious history. We were discussing the story of Lilith, and her lack of mention from the Bible. Several hours later in the day we turn on the History channel and see a show on stories omitted from the Bible, with the first story being about Lilith.
• On the same show, there was also a story about Aseneth. She was seeking purification when an angel sent a swarm of bees to surround her and to build a honeycomb around her mouth. The story was beautiful and similar to the sketch I had finished a week ago, before learning about Aseneth.
• I was admiring the album cover artwork for The Bedlam in Goliath by Mars Volta and asked David if he knew who the artist was, he didn’t. The next day a friend of mine sent me a story about a very dark painting and how stupid people thought it was haunted. David and I looked up the artist and found out it was the same man who painted the Mars Volta album cover.

I’m going to do a painting for Aseneth.

social opposites

Why is it that strangers always talk to David when we’re out? He tries to look very unapproachable and angry but it never comes off that way. He claims that he hates them and never wants to speak to new people, but I think he’s lying, because I don’t understand it. I, on the other hand, am a more social creature, but I have the opposite problem. I look unapproachable when I would rather have people come talk to me. I think I’m the unpopular kid at school.

hair poison

I woke up to a clear morning, but as I was getting ready to step out the door I noticed that it was raining, hard. I stood there for a second contemplating the risks of running the few feet to my car and getting a little wet, or having to dig around for an umbrella for however long that would take and getting frustrated in the process. It hadn’t rained much (or at all) since I moved into my house back in August, so I never had a reason to unpacked my umbrellas. They are still sitting all cozy and warm somewhere in the garage. I ran with my car key ready and only managed to get a little wet.

“A little wet” is enough for my hair to turn into a complete monster. No matter how nicely I blow dried it and fixed it up, 10 seconds in the rain undid all of my hard work. The heat and humidity in Texas is why I don’t even bother fixing my hair during half of the year and just let it go curly. To make matters worse, I had no bobby pins with me once I got to work and saw the damage.

Reminder: The Scuba Bee art contest is still going on! We now have a few very cool submissions, but I know there are a bunch more of you creative minds out there who want to win sexy original Tina Vaziri paintings. The prize for this contest is an 11″x17″ acrylic and color pencil painting on bristol board.

The new deadline is April 6th.

things that make me want to throw up

Okay maybe not really throw up, but still…

• dog smell – I like some dogs, they are cute, but 99.9% of them smell like dog, because they are dogs. And dog smell makes me gag, so I don’t think I can ever own a dog.
• fake cherries aka maraschino cherries – ugh why must they mess with a good thing, REAL cherries are good, fake cherries are so gross and sweet they make my throat burn with an inferno of hatred (fake cherries recently discovered in Hershey Kisses, blegh)
• fake strawberry – not as bad as fake cherry, but please don’t hand me any kind of candy or sweets with fake strawberry flavor. You may hand me real strawberries instead.
• real banana – I think this stems from repeated childhood trauma of my mom trying to force me to eat bananas for years because “they’re GOOD for you!”, YEARS of torture, which started my lifelong hatred of bananas. They also make my tongue itch, I have a lot of food “allergies” that hurt my mouth, but I’ve never gone to have an allergy test done because I don’t want to stop eating all the fruits and veggies that I love. Also, fake banana flavor = pretty good, and even better than that is anything apple flavored or scented.
• trash/dirty dishes – If the trash hasn’t been taken out or dishes not cleaned right away, I’ll smell it, and go crazy and think of giant germs and mold
• screaming children – No explanation necessary
• raw chicken – I don’t know why this grosses me out so much, I don’t have a problem with any other raw meat. I usually make David cook chicken, or I’ll cook it for a really long time “just in case”… also increases thoughts of giant germs and salmonella
• mold, rust, or broken glass – I fear not seeing them, getting them on my skin, and instantly dying. So if I do see them, I want to die instantly
• skin diseases – I can watch surgeries, see blood, guts and everything else EXCEPT skin diseases. Worst of all was that “tree man” in the news a couple of months ago. I won’t link to it, because I don’t want to see it again, and I don’t want to subject anyone else to the horror (giant germs)
• worms – I don’t like bugs, but worms make me want to vomit, the smaller they are the more vomit I could potentially produce

Okay, I’m done grossing myself out.

ugh music

I had been against this whole Apple Mac trend since the beginning, thinking of them as overly expensive, and inferior products. I refused to buy myself any kind of iPod. It helped that after my first year of college, I stopped really listening to music, it wasn’t important to me. David would occasionally give me new music to listen to on my computer, and I liked some of them, but I could go months without listening to anything and not think twice about it.

Recently, David got the iPod Touch, after I finished scoffing and rolling my eyes, I noticed that it was actually really awesome. We listen to it during all car rides, and often end up singing loudly, blissfully, and out of tune to each other. Busy with his new toy, he gave me his first generation Shuffle for when I went to the gym. It was nice to have at the gym, and it made me listen to some new music. At home, I started doing crazy little dances that usually scared Mojito, I’m going to blame it on the new music.

Last week, I got a third generation Nano as a gift and it has made me a little more excited about music again. I’ve downloaded a few new albums and I even listen to it at work. Maybe I can once again join the ranks of normal people who enjoy listening to music.

Reminder: The Scuba Bee art contest is still going on! The deadline is April 6th.

spring and new beginnings

 

Today marks the first day of spring and the beginning of the Iranian year. If you celebrate Nowrūz, I hope you have a wonderful start to the new year. If you don’t celebrate you can still enjoy the beginning of spring, beautiful flowers, and warmer weather.

I’m going to go eat amazing Iranian food tonight, with some wonderful family and friends. Yum!

happy bunny day

I always tell David that I only speak truths that I read in peer reviewed scientific journals.

It’s true, I swear.

breathing, not breathing

You know what sucks? Asthma

I recently found out that I have asthma after my two colds around December and January. Oh yeah, that never ending cough that I had every winter of my life, the occasional wheezing, the mysterious “feels like my brain and face aren’t getting oxygen even though there is no wheezing” that’s apparently asthma. And the non-wheezing attacks are supposedly the worst kind, great.

I feel helpless even though I have an inhaler now… I had a non-wheezing attack on the drive home from work, it felt awful. Took nearly two hours until I stopped feeling shaky and weak.

It’s interesting and scary to feel like air is coming in half way but no oxygen is reaching my body.

beautiful characters

Watching Grandma knit

I have many secret inspirational influences that I keep hidden away and only share with my most trusted confidants. But my amazingly talented friend Adam Osgood turned me onto this one, so I can’t claim it and keep it hidden like the others: The Sartorialist is filled with captivating photographs of real people wearing beautiful clothing in day to day life. The images have a magic of their own, a little different form the usual magic that I dream about and incorporate into my work, this is real life. The images are truly breathtaking.

I want to take many of these characters and place them into my paintings, but until then, you must see the gorgeous work Adam has already done with this inspiration.