RUINED BUILDINGS

I've added a new location to the Lost Cities section--some ruined buildings, littered with fallen bricks, telephone poles leaning dangerously. Here's one of the images, with Nemesis in the foreground and Enoja in the distance. Check out the other images here: http://evidenceofalostcity.com/evidencecities/ruins.html

A Redesigned Website

I've gone over the Evidence website, and redesigned the pages. If you havent looked at it for a while, youll find new photos and videos--I actually seem to be making progress. In particular check these links out--

Ophelia, a photo album of the second guide

Nemesis: a video of the first guide

Young John: A Photo Album

ORIFICE

I've finally finished formatting and illustrating another of my novels, this one the more recently written Orifice. It was an attempt to rather slide into an opening--thus an orifice--leading into another world, a place full of erotic mystery. This, of course, is what I am trying to do with Evidence of a Lost City--and arguably what I've tried to do with all my novels, whether I was conscious of it or not. Below is one of the illustrations for the e-book. It's available at Amazon and Barnes and Noble, along with three others...

INTERVIEW WITH A WRAITH

After a rather lengthy pause, I'm working again on the movie of Evidence: an interview, this time, with one of the wraiths--the guide I call Enoja. So far I have about a 45 second sequence: she raps at a door, enters a room, sits. Now I begin the interrogation. There will be three interviews, I believe, which will start three different sections of the movie. First is Enoja, the Dancer; then there will be Ophelia, the Actress; and finally Dolorous, the Whore. I'll be using Mimic to synchronize the voice-to-lip movement. When I have some more put together, I'll post a video here.....

THE MADNESS OF THE BLACK SWAN

We watched The Black Swan last night. Terribly disappointing. Natalie Portman's acting ranged all the way from histrionic to very histrionic. Vincent Cassel, in a kind of Balanchine-type role, had all the charisma of a wet Russian. Mila Kunis reminded me of Lindsey Lohan on Rohypnol. Of course this couild have been the fault of the director, Darren Aronofsky, who may have an eye for visual imagery but it seems only the most superficial grasp of character and plot. Ms Portman's descent into madness is a journey into the depths of cliche. I enjoyed the first couple of minutes, for its visual poetry, and thought Portman's dance, at the end, as the black swan, had some real power. The production values are terrific, of course, like most big budget American films, good lighting, clever use of mirrored images, but that isnt enough to carry the movie.


I was particularly interested in seeing the movie because of its relevence to Evidence. In Evidence, a man--young John--descends into the underworld/dreamworld, and one of his guides, whom I call Enoja, is a dancer. But I found no inspiration in this black swan, except in the sense of what I wish to avoid...

MUSING ABOUT THE MUSE

Part of what I am doing here is creating a "muse"--taking one of the digital Poser/Daz figures and focusing my creative energy on her. I've done this all my life with "real" women, of course. Mostly they were women I knew only slightly, or indeed not at all, just someone I saw in passing—for instance, an elegant lady crossing a street or sitting in a cafe, a woman with a kind of erotic pizzazz, a way of walking, a sense of subterranean sexuality stirring within her. Such a figure seems to provide a kind of open doorway: I enter, and discover my novel. The couple times I tried this with a girlfriend, however, did not work, perhaps because reality tends to intervene. Novels—however rooted they are in the real world—are fantasies. They are creations. If a muse says “No!”—No, I wont wear those shoes, No, I don’t have time for this, or No, I don’t have to cater to your sexual/artistic fantasies—then the doorway she offers slams shut. It is much safer to use a woman with whom I have no contact: I can thus imagine whatever I wish. But as I age, there seems fewer and fewer of these women-muses, and those I do find seem less powerful, less profound: they last for a chapter or two, and then dry up. I’ll write more about this later. But if this dynamic—using real women—has become undependable, why not try to use a truly imaginary woman? Why bother with reality at all?

One of the characters I am using in the movie version of Evidence I call “Enoja,” which is Spanish for “Anger.” She is a rather feral creature. I think of her as a “guide,” a sort of Beatrice to my Dante. I expect to use three or four of these guides, who are characters in the movie, to help me. To emphasize their individuality—to help make them “real” in their particular imaginary way—I am experimenting with their looks, their clothes, their manner. I am also using them in my other work. I’ve recently finished the e-book version of Mofa, for instance, my second novel; and I used Enoja to illustrate it. I also used a variation of her for Orphe, which is also an e-book, and am using still another variation for Orifice, which will be my next publication. This is a kind of exploration of Enoja as Muse. This exploration seems to be working. Ideas, images, possibilities are coalescing around her in my subconscious. I am curious to see where she will lead me.