Liminality

The second phychogeography assignment asked us to photograph "liminal spaces", meaning spaces in-between.

I interpreted liminal spaces to mean a space that is neither one thing or the other. Liminal spaces are places where a little bit of two environments are present, but neither one dominates the space. With this limitation, I photographed areas around my own environment, my house, that had two different feels to them. I took pictures of places where you were able to see two different rooms or spaces at once.

Lost

What a crazy week.

Earlier in the week we improved at the community center. I gained a lot from that. I was nervous about auditioning for the school play, but improv reminded me that I've done this before, that I have all of freshmen year in theater class and last year in STAC to fall back on. I was a bit more reassured, but my nerves did not go away. I haven't been acting all summer, and I really needed to refresh my memory. I needed to remember how to give myself up to a character I've created. I don't think I'll be any less nervous on Monday, but at least now when I walk in and see the director staring at me, I won't view him a species from an alien planet.

We've also been practicing writing synopsis's and log lines. At, first it was difficult to summarize all of your ideas into a small paragraph or line. It was one major problem I had all of last year. For every improv we had to perform we were given little time to organize our ideas. Those who were able to come up with only the major points were able to improv something amazing, but most of the time we would get caught up in details and then have a great beginning with no where to take it. This skill will come in handy when we do out Be Kind Rewind films.

The part of the week that overshadows the the rest would be the spy game.

Wow.

I went to a really dark place, looking back at it I see myself becoming a monster. I've always thought of myself as a pretty honest person, it's scary when you find out that you are wrong. I've created an image for myself and my fellow STACies and that image was shattered. People will do whatever it takes to survive, even if dying only means you're out of the game. I think that everybody, myself included took it way too seriously. I cannot say that I wish we never played though. I think it was an interesting experience. Somebody compared it to Lord of the Flies, while it was not that intense, it did give us a glimpse of what may happen if we were to become stranded on a deserted island. Even if I became a little scared, I thought that it was fun. It was really interesting to read people, and to be able to see somebody when they are vulnerable and sneaky. I can't wait to discuss this in class.

Broken Bits and Pieces

People tend to strive for perfection. They want the perfect job, the perfect spouse, the perfect children they could line-up for Grandparents to see in their neat clean, -and perfect- Sunday School outfits. I personally think that perfection is boring. Evenly cut grass, and wrinkle-free shirts are of no interest to me. I like the chaos of imperfection. It makes life, and art for that matter, a lot more intersting. For this project, I decided that I was only going to shoot things that were cracked, smashed, disassembled, abandoned and basically anything that had flaws. So with the word "broken" in my mind I went searching for the pictures. I ended up shooting things that some might see as useless.

Murder

So, I just spend the last three hours not doing my homework and instead thinking of ways to kill people.

Yup.

I am really getting into this spy stuff. Now that the class has advanced to phase three (or something like that) things are really getting interesting. I am even paranoid about what I am going to write here. I wouldn't want to give anything away now would I? It's frustrating in a way. I want to talk about this game with everyone, but I know that I can't do that. You can't trust anyone nowadays.

Earlier this week, we watched the second episode of "The Prisoner". It amazes me how much they can include in one episode, even if it is an hour long. They each seem like movies to me. I wonder if they would ever run out of possibilities. But then again, can you ever run out of possibilities when you are a spy? They are even going to get into mind control.

Patrick McGoohan simply amazes me. I love the way he does something very small, like raise an eyebrow a millimeter and he has you asking all of these questions. You immediately begin to wonder what he is thinking and it makes him seem ten times wiser. You think you know something in this show, and then McGoohan would tilt his head back slightly and you have no idea.

The Blob

Wow. It feels like summer never happened, as if school continued on as usual and then suddenly all your classes are changed and the seniors are gone. But, at the same time, it feels as if a lot has changed, like you changed over the summer and you just don't know what changed yet.

STAC is back in session! This was the class that I have been looking forward to. I can't wait to experience all the new things that this year will bring. Even though I absolutely hate routine, I can't wait to get back into the swing of things again. This year will be different, as all years are different. No more laziness , I will try to get serious.

Today we started to watch "The Prisoner". What an interesting and weird story that was. It was kind of like the past two movies I saw, "Shutter Island" and "Inception", where it messes with reality and paranoia. It also reminded me of a little project that me and Ashley were working on during the summer, although we ended up going in a different direction. In this little project was the story of a sand monster who would attack couples at the park, much like that creepy blob bubble in "The Prisoner".

Also, the new spy assignments are getting me exited.