Latest Roll

 

Yesterday I came back from a 10 day vacation with my Grand Pa. We went to Corrèze in the center of France and it was beautiful. We've seen a lot of absolutely gorgeous little villages, castles and country roads. I shot 6 rolls. I would have taken more but I only brought theses six. It was a blast.

 

Yesterday I came back to 'real' life. Not so 'real' because it's only the beginning of vacation time for me. On tuesday I'm flying to Portland, OR, for a month. There is still a lot of things to do to be ready for this trip but I'm very excited.

 

These two are from a exhibit I saw at the Quai Branly Museum, Tatoueurs et Tatoués. About tattoos and tattoo artists. The picture of the arm is a mummyfied tattooed arm. It was the most impressive thing to see there. I wasn't too thrilled about the whole thing. It was not very original, mainly the history of tattoos and tattoo artists through time and countries. I guess I was expecting a little bit more or something different. Besides, I love tattoos but I'm not very interested in the industry and tattoo artists. I love picking an artist out of the blue just by walking in a tattoo shop and picking the one I like best by his or her portfolio.

I think what I wanted to see was pictures of tattoos on different people telling us their motivations behind getting tattoos and the stories behind the pieces they got. And also, a selection of tattoo artists and what they liked about their job, what they love to tattoo and what they don't. Things like that.

 

Plants growing on a building by the Quai Branly Museum.

 

We found a new spot to have a beer during august, it such a typical little parisian café, we went there twice and we were almost the only costumers each time. It was kind of sad for the place but I really enjoy uncrowded places. We've been there tonight and it was a completely different story, people got back to Paris, vacation time is over! So long deserted August Paris!

 

 

Street art by our place. Ever changing! I guess it will be different pieces when we get back in a month! 

 

These are the last pictures before my trip to Corrèze. Just the little things. :) I'm so tired right now.

I have so many things on my mind! It's a good thing. Tomorrow will be a busy day,the day after as well...And finally on Tuesday we fly.............

Portland Goals

 

In a couple of weeks I'll be on a plane to Portland, OR. I don't even know where to begin or what I want to say about it. After 10 years of travelling mainly to Chicago I have to say I'm confused and scared to discover a whole new city for a month. Mastering public transportation is my number one fear. We get to Portland at night and we'll have to figure out which buses to take to get to the place we rented. We could take a cab but I'm not really into the idea of spending $40 right after we got off the plane. Plus our luggage will be super light at our arrival and not so light on the day we have to leave, so... Taking the bus on the 1st day is a better option.

Anyway, it's not a post about public transportation. :p

I'm always afraid of anything new. It's going to be a whole new city to discover and manage to get around without a map all the time (something I really hate, the map thing). It was easy in Chicago and the parts of the city we were interested in were at a walkable distance from one another. We walked A LOT nonetheless.

Yesterday night I made a list of things I really wanted to do during our 30day stay in Portland. Some of them are pretty easy and/or don't really matter if I can't pull them out but others are really important to me, those are mainly about me going out of my confort zone.

• TAKE (AT LEAST) ONE PICTURE A DAY THAT TAKES ME OUT OF MY COMFORT ZONE: I'm bringing my Canon A1, it is a film camera I've been using quite a lot lately and I'm planning on taking loads of pictures with it. It would be nice if I felt a little bit less self conscious about taking certain pictures. I'd like to try my hand at taking self-portraits in public for example. I'd like to take pictures in supermarkets, stores or markets. I always feel embarassed, as if I was intruding on people's life for instance when I'd like to take pictures of market stalls. I somehow feel it's wrong. I need to get over that and probably ask people if it's OK for me to take pics beforehand.

•  VISIT THE JAPANESE GARDENS: That's an easy one and that's the place that sold me Portland. Ten years ago I visited the Huntington Library in Los Angeles and was blown away by the Japanese garden there. It was one of the most beautiful, peaceful and soothing place I have ever seen.

• SEE KAREN LOVELY PERFORM ON SEPT. 26: About 3 years ago my Dad introduced me to the music of this amazing Blues singer, Karen Lovely. She's from Portland, I asked her on FB if she was performing in September and she very kindly replied that indeed she was on Sept 26. It's my Dad's birthday :) He asked me for her autograph :) I hope to get my picture taken with her as well (fangirling...).

• GO TO THE BEACH: I'd like to see the Pacific again. And Greg has never seen it. We'll have to take the bus or carpool which is a whole other adventure and it's pretty cool.  

• GET A NEW TATTOO: Easy one I think but you never know.

• MAKE TEN DRAWINGS: I'm going to bring my drawing kit, I need to have new material for when I come home to make new jewelry. And it's always nice to make this kind of things when you're away from home. It's a nice memory that you can keep.

• MAKE THIRTY BROOCHES: Same thing as the one above.

• WALK A LOT: I need to walk, I need to excercice! I've been stuck on my couch for nearly 8months now.

• KEEP TRACK OF EVERY DAY IN A NOTEBOOK: Last year I wrote down what we did every day in Chicago. It's cool to go through these pages again and relive the moments. And with my bad memory, it's kind of a must do.

• WRITE BLOG POSTS FROM PORTLAND: We bought a laptop a couple of weeks ago mostly because we wanted to use it in Portland. So I'd better do something with it.

• GO TO MARKETS/CRAFT FAIRS/FLEA MARKETS/GARAGE SALES: I don't think I need to explain this.

• TALK TO PEOPLE: A pretty hard one. Most of the time I go to the US with my French family/friends and I don't even try ro talk to other people, not even for a minute. I tried to let go of that a little last year. It's too bad I'm not more outgoing because a lot of people in the US tend to be a lot more friendly than French people. They make it easier to talk.

• SEND POSTCARDS: I always say I will but never do. I'd like to at least send a postcard to my best costumers this year.

• TAKE MORE FILM PICTURES OF US AND THE LITTLE THINGS: Last year I shot about 5 rolls of film in Chicago and only 5 or 6 pics had Greg on them. I have a ton of digital ones, but it's not the same. And for the little things, I'd like to have memories of the drinks we had at bars, the food at restaurants, the flowers we walk by, details... Not just buildings and landscapes.

That's it, that's my list. :)

I'm half excited, half terrified. I'm always dead scared that I won't be able to go. That I didn't fill up the papers right and the plane ticket is no good, things like that... And this time we have a connection from San Francisco to Portland. Connections are a lot of stress too... But I'll feel better when I'm on the plane, and even better when I'm on the American soil.

In the Hallway

 

To finish up this roll, I set up my camera in the hallway/staircase of the building.

Our bulding is pretty old and typically parisian. Zinc rooftops, narrows stair case...

 

Pipes showing all over the place.

 

I should smile more on pictures. :p

 

Hello!

 

 

I cannot wait to go to Portland on September 1st. I'm very eager to take lots of pictures of new things.

Sharp Unsharp

 

Another day, another set of pictures. For some reason all of the self portraits of this series ended up out of focus. I'll blame it on the wine.

 

I need to stop taking pictures of my cat on this box.

 

Shrunken head.

 

Hello from the 4th floor!

 

Summer treat.

 

Lots of craft supplies.

 

Peeking.

Chilling.

 

Just a test.

 

 

Fall in Summer

 

 The week end before last, the weather was a bit weird here in Paris. It was pretty brisk out but the sun was shining bright but kind of white, like a fall sun. It was so nice and I didn't know what to do with myself so I decided to take as many pictures as I could with my film camera(Canon A1). I had ordered a bunch of 36 exposure rolls, it was time to test one of those. :)

 

I shot a little series of myself putting on my makeup in the miror but I completely messed up the setting and they ended up horrible. Too bad because I was having a good time in the bathroom, Massive Attack was playing on the radio (Unfinished sympathy). Anyway, here is a picture of me eating pasta instead. :)

 

 

Cat sniffing.

 

Peeping tom. He loves to watch the neighbours going about their business. 

 

I had a blast shooting these but they're not that exciting to look at :p I had to set the camera in the hallway and run through the appartment and pose at the window in ten seconds before the timer went off

 

Loading the Minolta with my last black and white roll. Right after I was done my cat made a big box of clothes on top of the shelf fall in a loud crash, I shot a pic of the box and the cat both falling. I can't wait to see that!

 

A bunch of drawings.

 

Showing off my tattoos.

 

Drinking Perrier.

 

Camera up on the tripod.

 

Hello!  

I'm disappointed the pictures didn't turn out as good as I would have wanted but I really did experiment a little more with my camera. Shooting self portrait is more fun than looking at them.

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