bad girls (with pearl earrings) club
vermeer, matisse, and conquering my irrational fear of upsetting people
chiaroscuro: the use of strong contrasts between light and dark
the best example i can show you to demonstrate chiaroscuro is an artsy-gal staple, vermeer’s girl with a pearl earring. look at her: chic, dramatically accessorized, aglow against the stark black background. i’d like to think my art tastes skew more interesting and obscure, but put me in front of a dutch master and i am floored every time. what can i say?
the second-best example i can show you of chiaroscuro is my first (and only) tattoo, lovingly modeled after henrí matisse’s cutouts. exhibit B in the case of my Very Basic Taste. i got my amateur art history degree at the University of Tumblr, Pinterest, and Wikipedia, summa cum laude, high honors. sue me, bitch!
matisse’s cutouts are some of his most famous works. i’ve always been drawn to the bright colors of gouache on paper, the fluidity and plant-like playfulness of the shapes. the cutouts were created in the final years of matisse’s life, painting with scissors when painting the traditional way became too much of a physical strain.
i love matisse’s cutouts as a metaphor: art as enduring. meeting yourself where you are. continuing to surprise yourself and look for joy well into old age. they represent everything i’d like to carry with me always.
and yet.
i’d like to say i was Chill Cool Girl about tattooing this on my body, but i waffled for about two years before i went full-send. the permanence intimidated me — it would be a crossing of a threshold, a stark Before and After. my arm would never be the same again. i would never be the same again. would i know how to carry myself like a Girl With A Tattoo?
more than that, i couldn’t shake the feeling of intense, irrational guilt. i hardly know anyone who doesn’t have a tattoo or two these days, but as much as this was representative of the light, airy metaphor about art i love so dearly, this was equally representative of a darker fear: making a public decision that not everyone in my life would be a fan of. one that could alter their perception of me as infallibly good with immaculate taste. one that could brand me as bad girl.
still, i wanted it. still, i walked into that cozy studio and dozed off to the dull buzz of a sharp needle as old reruns of seinfeld played in the background.
still, the harpys of old-school fears and stereotypes sunk their shrieking claws into the most delicate bits of my perception-obsessed psyche. they did not let go until the scabbing healed and i could finally take baths again. until i’d lifted my sleeve for everyone i love and let them see the piece of beautiful art proudly, nervously hung on the gallery of my body.
so, yes, in the end, i will never be the same again. what a gift. i can never take it back. what a gift! some people in my life might not like it. what a gift!!!!
this is not about my tattoo anymore. it’s been almost two years.
it’s about how it’s scary to stand firm in a public setting. how hard it is to stand brightly against the dark and say, this is all me, all of it. i am saying these sentiments and i am also kicking and screaming, fighting them internally. (multitudes.) i love surrounding myself with people who have befriended The Potential Of Dislike and cozied up to the inevitable reality of it. i’m getting there.
my tattoo is a promise to myself to keep making art, but it is also a promise to say the “wrong” things, to go boldly and ink permanently the truths that make me want to go into witness protection. i am climbing Cringe Mountain, and it is my everest. on the proverbial resume of life skills, i could list years of experience in Nitpick, Self-Editing, Vulnerability Hangovers and Wanting To Delete Everything And Not Be Perceived.
still, i’d like at least another tattoo or two. i’d be lying if i said i wasn’t waffling about the next one, or the one after that. i’d like to put out lots of writing into the world. i’d be lying if i said i wasn’t waffling about my next essay or querying my first novel or the novels and essays that will come after that. i waffle about a lot. but i’m trying to trust myself more.
i crave a second and third and even tenth opinion, but i crave mine most.
don't forget about ur MFA at haley jakobson university
!!!!!! This put into words so many things I feel!!!!!!