In the face of an invisible enemy, our best weapon to ward off anxiety might just be the alchemy of flour, water and yeast ā however poorly constructed.
Turns out, all of us are capable of turning out some bad, lumpy, dense bread that looks like a middle-school biology experiment gone wrong. The attempt and the failure unifies us to the likes of Henry Cavill and Carly Rae Jepsen. Shitty supermarket bread is gone. Long live shitty homemade bread.
There is something surreal and hilarious about the fact that all we can do to respond to the gloom and anxiety of economic ruin and illness is to punch water and flour together. Itās especially ironic given that bread has long been considered the territory of the āseriousā home baker, given that it can be sensitive to subtleties (like room humidity) and messy in untrained hands. Almost everyone who has tried to bake bread, especially a naturally fermented one like sourdough, has a story of abject failure.
Looking back, long after the dust had settled and the casualties were moved to the morgues and those few remaining hospitals, this was what started it. The great reckoning began with a single statement.Ā
āI lied about having a plan.āĀ
They was just about the exact damn words she expected to come out of Chelleeās mouth, but goddamn this girl still managed to surprise her. If only optimism wasnāt woven into Jesseās psyche like some sort of malignant hair extension she might have already sorted everything herself. But no.Ā Ā Optimism was why Jesse was now staring down the barrel of the shotgun known as a history presentation without the second half of the project: an exercise for the class exploring Imperial Romeās politics.Ā
āThe Roman empire managed to survive multiple tyrants, but, uh... gradual over-expansion and...ā With each powerpoint slide she got closer and closer to the unedited, undesigned, unwritten slides that the over contoured, aspiring YouTube beauty Vlogger had decided were less important than her follower count.Ā
Three, two, one. Click. Emptiness.Ā
Think of something, Jesse. Bitch please, you know this backwards and forwards from the Ides of March to the Burning of Rome.
And there it was. The idea that would change all of their lives forever should they survive the events that would unfold.Ā
āEmperor Nero was famous for many things, but mainly he is famous for a single event in the year 64 A.D.āĀ
Chelley had a lighter. At least she was good for something.Ā
You fall so far that at some point you forget that you are falling. The speed at which you careen through the air strips you naked and still it is not enough and every foot you fall tears more and more away.Ā
You fall until you are nothing but air yourself. Formless. Unmade. And still you fall.Ā
Until you hit the atmosphere.Ā
Light and sound and scent and taste assault this being that you once calledĀ āme.ā Color whips across your face and paints your vision with images of what lies below you. Shapes emerge from the clouds and you reach out. You grasp and cling but the momentum has you in its grip.Ā
The transition from space to air to ocean takes the air from your lungs and for a moment you face upwards, looking at the world you are leaving behind in your endless pursuit of the bottom.Ā
The darkness closes in, pressing all of the sights you have seen close; imprinting it into your skin. The depths are a forge. They remake you and hold you tighter than you can bear but you keep falling.Ā
Perhaps you will be crushed into the abyssal plain. Your visions of the world and all its possibilities scattered amongst the denizens of the deep.Ā
Or perhaps you will emerge from the crust, glittering and strong.Ā
Notice how Shan Yu doesnāt even question it or make a comment about āBUT YOUāRE A GIRLā he just instantly goes into a āIāLL TEACH YOU TO KILL MY MEN AND STEAL MY VICTORYā rage and I think about this a lot sometimes
((Well that might have to do with the fact that heās a Hun. Ā Women among the Huns had higher status than their Chinese counterparts and even some of their own men. Women were free to hunt and fight along side of the men, could choose their own husbands and divorce him if she choose to. There were even records of clans being led by women leaders. So for Shan Yu Mulan is just another soldier))
Story Time: Get a load of what happened to me at Starbucks today.
Thereās a running joke among people who know me personally that I unwittingly go out in public with a sign on my forehead stating āI Am Non-Threatening. Come Talk To Me.ā Because if thereās a chance a bizarre conversation with a total stranger is going to happen, Iām typically the person it happens to.
Some context: I have been pretty darn sick this week. (Itās not Coronavirus, donāt worry.) Since the work in my queue for my day job is comprised entirely of audio narration right now, and I currently sound like a waterlogged Demi Moore, I havenāt been able to work these last couple of days. As a result, Iāve been using my down time to knock out as much of Manuās redesign as possible. Today, to ensure I didnāt spend the day languishing in sinus misery, I medicated the crap out of myself and took Manu to the Starbucks down the block from my sonās day care.
I hit the bathroom, then picked an empty table, but as soon as I sat down with my venti Comfort Tea and started tweaking the inks on my iPad, I felt the eyes of the man next to me looking over my shoulder.
When I looked up, he had his phone out. āIām sorry,ā he said (in a thick accent I couldnāt place geographically), āI donāt want to disturb. I notice you art. You are artist!ā
I tried to smile. āYes, Iām... Well, Iām trying to be,ā I croaked.
He leaned in, like he was sharing a secret.
āI am artist, too.ā
He stuck out his hand.
I gently took it, grateful for the bathroom trip I just took in which I washed the scourge off of my fingers.
āCan I?ā he asked, holding his phone up.
āTake a picture? Uh... sure,ā I said. Itās not like he would be able to steal Manu out from under me or anything, I figured. The panel I was tweaking was magnified out to Guam.
āI am artist. Architect and Designer,ā he clarified while he steadied his phone over my iPad. āI am Ilker. What is your name?ā
āIām Venessaā I said, trying to be polite. This, I thought warily, is precisely how I get myself into trouble. Iām too damn nice.
āYou know, I come to America twenty years ago from Turkey...ā
I put down my stylus. This was going to be a while.
āI like Turkey,ā he explained. āI like the country and I like the people. But I am artist. I am not... religious man.ā
I nodded.
āI told my wife I was going to go to America and she said, āwhat are you going to do? You donāt have job! You donāt have money! No Visa!ā And I said, āI am artist and architect. I will paint and sell my paintings.
āSo I come to America alone. To New York City. I sit outside, and I paint. And people, they liked my paintings. They bought them. This one for $30, that one for $50.
āOne day, a man comes over to me and he say, āI like your painting. I see you are also architect.ā And he gives me his number and asks me to go to meeting at his office. Because he wants to offer me a job. He starts to talk about a building contract.
āI tell him I donāt know anything about contracts. I have no Visa. I am not American citizen. But he says, āThatās okay. I will take care of everything. You will have nothing to worry about.ā And this man, he gave me a job. $173,000 a year. And my wife, he gave her a job too. She was project assistant. I bring her and my two daughters over from Turkey.ā
āWow,ā I said, not fully believing the veracity of what sounded like a full-on immigration fairy tale.
āHere,ā said Ilker, unlocking his phone and opening up his Facebook app. āI show you my work.ā He paused and looked up at me. āI am interrupting. You donāt mind?ā
At this point, I was invested. I had to see. Because whatever he was about to show me would either prove or disprove this yarn he was spinning. āPlease,ā I said, gesturing for him to go ahead.
He opened his photos and my jaw dropped. His work... was UNREAL.
āThis is building I designed on Madison Ave.... And this one in Chelsea...ā
Holy crap. I had just been to Chelsea with my sister last month on a trip to see a broadway show. I had crossed the intersection of the building he was, at this moment, telling me he designed.
He flipped through more buildings. These, heād designed in Washington, DC. In Bethesda. In Arlington. All beautiful, streamlined, modern structures I had visited and parked my car in front of. He told me he did much of his concept work freehand. That he worked exclusively in natural media. His preferred media was pen, ink, watercolors, and chalks.
Between photos of his wife and daughters, he went on to show me photos from the RUSSIAN EXHIBITION OF HIS ARCHITECTURE ARTWORK.
Yāall, I was stunned. I couldnāt believe the talent I was sitting next to. Scattered among these gloriously rendered images of some of the most beautiful building concepts Iād ever seen were paintings of scenes in Central Park, the National Mall, and nudes from a life-drawing session he attends from time to time.
When he was done flipping through his phone, he looked at me and smiled. āI hope you donāt mind that I interrupt you. I show you all this because what you are doing is very good. And you should be encouraged. To draw is to make beauty.ā
I nodded, a lump in my throat. āThank you,ā I managed. āYour work is astonishing. I donāt even know what to say. What is your name again?ā
He held out his hand once more. āIlker Kocahan,ā he said. āI am getting more coffee. Can I get you one?ā
I looked at my still-full venti cup. āNo thank you. But here, please take my card.ā
He held my dinky business card like Iād handed him a treasure and thanked me.
Then Ilker got his coffee, and left the coffee shop.
At some point in his ramblings he talked about America as a place of dreams. How he credits this country with helping him rise to the top of his field where he is now able to sell his paintings for $800-$1000 a piece now that heās retired. My heart ached to hear him talk about that, knowing how our leadershipās positions on immigrants have taken such a dark and horrifying turn.
Imagine the buildings and museums and public places that would never have been if a business man in the park hadnāt lifted up a Turkish painter who spoke little English.
And now that painter was paying it forward on me.
I still feel pretty darn sick. Iāve still got body aches and a nose that has taken the rest of my face hostage.
But today was a really good day. And I just wanted to share it with you in case you are looking for reasons to keep drawing/painting/dancing/writing. It all counts and it is all good.
If you would like to see Ilker Kocohanās work, please click here.
Ilker Kocahan holds a bachelorās degree in Industrial Design with a minor in architecture from the University of Marmara, Faculty of Fine A
UPDATE TO THIS STORY! I would have posted this sooner, but quarantine has had the unexpected effect of zapping all my alone-time...
As luck would have it, I saw Ilker one last time before my area received the mandate to start social distancing. I came into the Starbucks to work on the āSimon Is On the Groundā comic while waiting to pick up my kid from day care, and there he was, happily chatting with the Starbucks manager, who gifted him with a Starbucks hat while I ordered my tea.
A week had passed since our first meeting, so I wasnāt sure heād recognize me. Lo and behold, as I turned the corner, I caught his eye, and he waved at me. This time, I asked if I might sit with him, and he warmly offered the seat beside him.
While I settled in, he told me that his project was being delayed and that he was going to leave the area and fly home before COVID-19 could make it impossible to travel. The hat was for his wife, whose only understanding of Starbucks was that Ilker really liked the coffee.
As one might expect, we immediately fell into another conversation about art, except this time, I eagerly abandoned my work to hear him talk.
And friends, did I ever get a master class.
He pulled up a painting on his phone which heād sold for $800. It was a life drawing in ink and watercolor of a woman in a demure gesture, barely detailed and colored in but for her rose-tinted lips and the shadow cast across her neck. He said he felt sad that heād sold it because he really loved how it came out.
āThis is no detailed like yours,ā he said, comparing his painting to my panel of Simon and Baz. āMine is simple. But in a few strokes, I can capture the life of the lady.ā
He took his napkin, turned it over, and pulled a pen out of his chest pocket. āLook there,ā he said, pointing to a man sitting a few tables away. He began to scribble away on the napkin, lines and lines and more lines. āYou see,ā he murmured as he ran his pen over the napkin, āI can, with speed, capture the man. I donāt have hours to ask him to sit. I must let go of the planning.ā
In seconds, the man across the room took shape on the napkin in a series of confident if also messy lines. It was incredible to watch.
I could instantly see what he meant. He had not produced a photorealistic version of this person on the napkin. But he had captured the manās essence. The aura of a real person sitting contemplatively with his coffee while reading the Washington Post. I could feel the life of the drawing radiate from the paper.
(When he was done, to my horror, he crumpled up the napkin.)
I shyly mentioned that Iāve been working hard on my own gesture drawing, but had a long way to go, so he asked to see my sketchbook.
I mean... is there even a word in the English language to describe the combination of dread and embarrassment that precedes showing an art master your crap-ass sketchbook that no one sees but you? I didnāt know what to do with myself as he sat there and flipped through the pages.
Eventually, he nodded approvingly and said, āOkay! Is good. But this is sketchbook like every other.ā He gestured at the page. āWhere are you?ā
I was lost for how to respond, but lucky for me, heās a talkative guy seemingly incapable of awkward silences.
āThe world needs to see you in the lines,ā he explained. āSomeone can look at my work and know, āthat painting is from Ilker Kocahan.ā You need to draw more and more so that when people look at your drawings, they will know: this work is Venessaās work.ā Then he shrugged and said, āAnd who knows. I will maybe see you in two years at this Starbucks, and by then, your drawings will be truly yours.ā
Iāve shared this story with some close friends who took mild offense on my behalf at his observations, but I really think it took sitting there watching him draw to understand exactly what he was talking about.
Ilker Kocahan has no imposter syndrome. He is supremely confident in every possible way where his art is concerned. The lines that flowed from his pen were fueled by his soul, not his brain. I didnāt think artists like him existed anymore until I was sitting there looking over his shoulder while he scribbled a man into existence, like it was nothing. When I asked if he plots out the perspective on his building sketches in advance, he shook his head no and doodled this on my cake pop wrapper while he rambled on about the components he likes to include in his architecture concepts:
(Donāt worry. I kept it.)
So when he talked about āfinding meā in my sketches, I really think he could senseāby the light scratch of the pencil, the trace evidence on the paper of my erasing and failed attemptsāmy own lack of confidence, my second guessing and self-doubt. My desire to be as good as other artists instead of my desire to express myself.
And in that sense, everything he was saying about my sketchbook was correct. He urged me to get off the iPad as often as possible. To sketch with ink, which is riskier because you canāt erase it, and in that way, give myself no choice but to commit to the lines.
The conversation turned to lighter things after that. Heās apparently an extremely talented basketball player who loves hanging out with his wife and kids. His daughters are both designers. He thinks quirky viral videos are the best thing about the internet. (I agreed.) Heās weak for New York pizza.
Eventually, he bought me a refill for my tea and asked if I would meet him again in a couple of days so he could talk to me about my artwork and help me with my sketching. He even added me as a Facebook friend. When I left the Starbucks to pick up Colin, I was so excited and overwhelmed and grateful to the universe for bringing me into his acquaintance, I texted everyone in my family about it.
But as fate would have it, that night, the local government released its mandate regarding social distancing. Heās likely in Belarus right now with his wife.
I wonāt lie and say Iām not devastated that I lost the chance to be his student for an afternoon. But the impression these coffee shop chats left on me was profound. I think about it all the time. For one who struggles with feeling like the artist version of Pinocchio waiting around for permission to be a real boy, it makes all the difference in the world to linger in the huge, unstoppable energy of someone who lives without an inner critic.
I hope I get to see him again after the quarantine is over. Iād love to see if I can fulfill Ilkerās prophecy and meet back at that Starbucks in two years with a different sketchbook in tow. One that I can hand over knowing without doubt or trepidation that anyone looking for me in the work need look no further than the bold stroke of my hand.
kianamaiart
theartofmadeline
ellievsbear
germansingergirl
