About a decade ago my photograph of the Tule Fog goat was included in The Big Picture installation in the ally on the side of Northtown Books. Grateful to have been a part of it, and to have happened to take a lap around the store in the hour before it burned to the ground. Still a lot to process, but I am beyond lucky to be a tiny part of the building's history.
These are for sale for $42 each at Good Day Shop in Arcata, California, or if you would like one delivered to your doorstep by the usps, reach out to me directly at [email protected] and we'll make it happen!
Happy FM-iversary @khha94.7! Here some info about how to fight fascism in Humboldt! Share near and far!
Did a black history month set today, you can listen for the next two weeks on the archive, it was a fun one. I also detailed on air a few reasons you should email [email protected] with your thoughts about their attempt to bring an amazon distribution warehouse to McKinleyville solely for the purpose of same-day delivery.
A few facts if you need a place to start:
➢One of the biggest polluters in the world when we’re in a climate crisis and supposed to be reducing greenhouse gas emissions
➢Well known for documented illegal and exploitative labor practices including denying workers’ their rights, horrible pay, and union busting
➢Their business model is to undercut local businesses, and once they’ve been forced out raise their prices again
➢THEY. SUPPORT. TRUMP.
➢They collaborate with ICE, including letting them use their warehouses as ̶d̶e̶t̶e̶n̶t̶i̶o̶n̶ ̶c̶e̶n̶t̶e̶r̶s̶ concentration camps
➢Supports weaponizing US and israley military and the genacide in Gaz
➢Gets the money from tax cuts that were created by denying healthcare to millions of Americans
If you wanna join the chat, help with templates, do some research lmk. The biggest thing until the public hearing is spreading the word and starting this off with a flood of public comments calling out the county’s hypocrisy. I weirdly have hope about this one, it was really easy to change the minds of the few people I’ve met who were in support of it at first. The masses who weren’t quite there before are starting to get it. Tell your friends, talk to your neighbors, speak your mind, we might just win.
2008, senior year of high school, in my new California College of the Arts shirt. Exploring the archive, recontextualizing, examining, Investigations 2 style.
I didn't really have much of a reaction to the closure announcement, it's been dead to me since they abandoned the Oakland campus and I wrote my eulogy back then. All I have to add now is I'm not surprised. For a century they sustained a small school focused on teaching and practicing the principals of the Arts & Crafts movement. They've already run it into the ground just two decades after dropping the "& Crafts" and that ethos in favor of westward expansion and cutting edge technology, building out a concrete warehouse and following the techies to sf instead of preserving the most beautiful campus on earth, and maximizing profits off art education to fund it all. All my love to every individual I know there, none of whom were a part of that; we were all robbed.
I've been working on lots of little art projects the last few months and it's been feeling more like my art school days than it has in years. Dug up this old photo, a piece I have in the works reminded me of it, so using it as an excuse to share this belated addition to my eulogy, and show off how cool I was (NOT!)
More thoughts IF YOU EVEN CARE. jk love y'all, it feels beyond silly shouting into this app right now but also connecting with distant friends and sharing my silly little art brings joy in this moment so not gonna think too hard about today.
I can't quite remember the ratio between satire and sincerity when I was styling for this shoot, I don't think I quite knew at the time either. I was terrified of being called a hipster poser so I think this was some kind of preemption of that? I did ask the Vietnamese lady at Style 2000 for a mullet ($13 for a haircut!!) and showed her a picture of Tegan and Sara (she asked which one.) I did wear giant orange paperclips as earrings that whole year. I did get a tattoo on my inner arm a few months later, a crow based on the one on this shirt, I didn't know the artist and didn't make a point to find them, and the tattooer I got to draw it up treated me like shit, classic millennial first tattoo. Those were not real glasses, I wore them to make fun of people who wear fake glasses just to look cool, and yet, I was the one who bought fake trendy frames with my barista waged. I did wear that keffiyeh a lot during the few months they were a fad knowing absolutely nothing about their origins, and gave it up as soon as I realized it was part of the broader cultural appropriation trend , but still had no idea its specific ties to Palestine, and that it was ok for me as a white jewish girl to wear it and it actually represented my values more than anything else I wore back then. I had still never heard someone say the word Palestine instead of "israɐl" or maybe "occupied Palestinian territory" ect. Strange how things come back around.
I definitely didn't know what I was getting into. I definitely had a bad feeling about all this, and this whole month have been feeling like that 17 year old kid smoking a cigarette and saying told you so (and then coughing a bunch and giving the rest away cause I don't know how to smoke cigarettes and am just being a little shit. Also I stole this bit from a story I forget who posted but resonated so adjusted to fit, full disclosure.) Anyway look out for more End Times Art, it's been a helpful way to process and balance this rage that little teenager kept burning these past 18 years.
Sincerely,
Tommy
p.s. This got long, and took time, sometimes I wonder who I put all this stuff together for before I hit post and then immediately remember it’s for me, because I enjoy doing it, because this is how I've processed my whole life, I grew up journaling and scrapbooking and showing my photo albums to friends and it was my favorite thing to do, and that turned into blogspot and myspace, and on from there, making a precious physical practice into and digital public display, and now we’re here, and I question how much longer some of the platforms will hold out one way or another, but it’s what we got today, and I still love finding old blog posts rambling on like this and seeing how things have and haven't changed, so here we are.
p.p.s Going to make this a triptych eventually with another old photo and something new I'm working on. The shot from my senior show of what ended up being a manic-episode-ass late edition to this art school baby's "thesis" where I just installed my bedroom and every photo album and scrap book I ever made starting age 8 for reasons I was not in the right state of mind when it came to me to remember how or even why later, though obviously exactly all this is why. It will make quite a pleasing progression when I finish up when I've been working on that brought me back to exploring my archive in the first place. Never gets old. Art for arts' sake, art for my sake.
p.p.p.s. JG EAT YOUR HEART OUT LOOK AT ME NOW TRC IYKYK
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