written while being on an Art Camp
Dramatis Personae:
(in order of age)
Kate - teacher and supervisor of students from Radom
Bartosz aka Baatilllathin - boy, art student from Radom
Rafał aka Słowik - boy, came together with his girlfriend Marta, he's not an art student
Kuba aka Boschman - boy, art student from Radom
Paweł aka Bioły - boy, art student from Radom
Alex - the narrator, girl, art student from Radom,
Marta - girl, art student from Radom
Mateusz aka Firlej aka Gej - boy, art student from Radom
Ania - Kuba's girlfriend, not present on the Camp but always present in his cellphone
Tajga - Kate's she-dog
1st of July
First day of an Art Camp. Right now, with a slight dizziness in my head, I can say without complaints that it's a good day. But it wasn't that easy at the beginning...
I was supposed to wake up at 4.35 in the morning - I woke up hour later not even being aware of my overslept. It stressed me out so much that I've got a super boost and managed to prepare myself in 30 minutes what is quite quick. Of course I've already had my bags packed and some nourishments prepared for the journey but I still needed time to wash my hair, do my make-up and eat breakfast to stop my tummy from making weird noises later on.
Breakfasts in the early mornings are tragic for me. I feel like I would vomit just because I have to make few bites of a sandwich and swallow them. I can't understand how some people can eat anything as soon as they wake up. A cup of tea or coffee is an only substitute available for me in the morning.
We, the 7 of us from our University, appeared at the railway station on time, bought tickets and got on a train. It wasn't that HOT then so we still had our moods on the right, happy and enthusiastic, level. But after spending more than two hours on another railway station waiting for another train we were not happy at all.
Then came a 6 hours long journey in tragic conditions and with sweat dripping from our foreheads. I've slept almost all the time to make it more resistible but I had to wake up sooner or later and sit in those conditions together with the rest of us. After getting to our destination place it was even worse because our clever boys (I'm sorry but I knew they would not pay enough attention while planning our travel and there will be some shortcomings) did not check where we can take bus for our next destination place and we were truly not prepared to walk across the whole city with our bags and all those heavy stuff we took. Thankfully, on the way to the resort we met few friendly and helpful people who offered us a ride. So we didn't die of exhaustion on the way ;)
The place we're now is quite nice - there is a lot of green, open spaces and places that make your imagination go wild. Tomorrow I'll get down to some artistic pictures and I'll check if I was right - I hope so!
Now, it's 2 in the morning (but I prefer to call it '2 in the evening' ) and we're after a small party with all the participants of the camp. We had free beer and a barbecue so I can call it a day ^^
I haven't forgotten it's the first day of A Piece A Day Marathon and I've made my work. It's something I have sketched earlier but now it's slightly changed and developed. I love those cats! Need to draw more of them :3
2nd of July
I had a bad night, it was hard for me to breathe in a type of air so different from the one I'm used to. First night in a new place usually is not that good, though, no need to worry - things will be better soon.
When I woke up at 7 in the morning it was hot already and it was hard to inhale - like if the air wasn't a gas but something solid that you have to take in spoons and put into your nose and mouth. Later it became even worse. Thankfully, when we were drawing near a stream it was more refreshing and we had a place to chill our beers. I was even astonished that all those insects flying and running here and there didn't bite me at all. Probably they've just decided that Kuba was a better person to bite since he complained a lot about being bug's favourite dish.
We were drawing for less than 2 hours so we still had plenty of time till the dinner. We laid on your beds exhausted with the heat and decided to make a little read of the books we took with us. I took the 2nd part of the 'Twilight' saga - 'New Moon' - and began to read. I have only read two chapters at home so the whole book was still to be read. I started. And I finished at 4 in the morning when I read the last words of the last chapter. Shut, those books can sometimes make me feel like hypnotised... And I was so angry I had to make brakes for dinner and supper and a little party in the evening. It's so hard for me to not read the whole book on one sitting...
About the book: I really hated Edward. Maybe not hated but I was astonished by his decision and his approach to the issue of Bella and her safety. Whatever you think it's bad to tore somebody's heart out of the chest, especially if you love this person - it makes no sense even if you say it is better that way and give examples why. It would take more time for me to get back to him after all. Once being damaged in that way you are not that easily to trust again. Wonder how will this plot evolve in the next novel.
About Jacob:
<3
It's exactly what I think. He's an incredible character. I loved this description as a personal sun :) I would like to meet somebody like him - it must be a great feeling.
My opinion and my hope is that Jacob will end up with Bella eventually. They're too alike to just let it go. It's such a different situation than her relationship with Edward, none of them is better than the other but the Jacob's one looks more promising to me. And I know that in Bella's situation I would do probably the same what she did - when you're in love it gets harder to divide what's really good and what's really bad, the perspective of seeing things changes too much.
It bugs me now that I took only one book :( Because now I'll re-think everything I've read in 'New Moon' for another 8 days, it's insane. I think I will also read it again in a moment of despair... But my sister should be happy about it - she can not tell now that I've read this book too quickly and I have given no thought to what I've just encountered and felt.
Still I like to take the whole story in one grasp and think later on, after finishing. I cry and laugh enough on the way so you can't tell I'm not truly reaching the bottom of the story.
Damn it, I want to read more! More! MORE!
...
Oh! Because of this whole book affair I've totally forgotten that I've made up two characters today and a little story about them. Her name is Anastasia and his is Frog :3
3rd of July
I can't stop thinking about the book... I would like so so sooo much to draw Jacob but because I saw the movie first it's hard for me to imagine him on my very own way. And as usual I'd get mad at myself because it's hard to draw exactly what you have on mind and it gets even more troublesome when you want it to be perfect and when you want it too hard.
.....
I'm so bored of the breakfasts and suppers here. They both are made of sandwiches and, to be true, I have never eaten as much bread as I did here in 3 days time. My tummy aches because if the amount of it and I have no other possibility than to eat it along with the others unless I want to be hungry. Fortunately, dinners are quite tasty...
It was a bit less hot in the morning because of the night's rain so we stayed inside - there was no place dry to sit outside anyway. I felt a bit distracted all the time because of the book, it looks like an addiction to me now, but I managed to draw something for the marathon :3
She looks like a cloud lady to me. Firstly, I thought of adding pinks and yellows with watercolours but as I finished shading with pencils I decided it looked good as it was and there was no need to change anything. I like how it ended, her face a bit like a statue and the clouds so delicate all over her.
After dinner, waiting for my beer to chill in the stream, I started drawing a new piece. I like it a lot since it's exactly what I want to make in/for school - this is The Art Camp's Piece.
When I sit down and search for something neat to draw or paint here I am absolutely not looking for something interesting but for places where the ghosts live, places where you can meet the spirits. Silly that only few people really see them on my pictures, like they were not expecting to see anything else than a bunch of trees or a bit of architecture. OPEN YOUR EYES, SILLY PEOPLE!
Today, for the first time on this Camp, we went on a meeting where everyone showed their works and all the teachers, lecturers and so on, that have came along with us, said what they thought about them, gave constructive criticism and praised what was made well. I had only two little drawings to show them, in opposite to all those big paintings people had made in 2 days time. I knew how would it look and it did look just as I've expected: they almost missed my works, then they were astonished that they are so small.. only a bit bigger than A4 format, and then they asked if I am planning to transport those idea into paintings or bigger formats. When I answered "No", they just told me to make more of them, like I didn't know that. And that was all. None of them saw the spirits, none of them even reached for the works to see them more closely. I'm a bit disappointed but this is exactly what pisses me off in this "artistic world" - that only few ways of being artistic can bring attention to what you're doing. This makes no sense to me and I will surely not change what I'm aiming for.
It's gruesome to walk here after the rain because the amount of frogs and toads had increased and it's not that a big frog can jump in front of you. No, no no. Tiny frogs and toads keep on travelling to and fro everywhere and it makes me feel really bad when I can incidentally squash some of them. I hate stamping on little creatures and feel them brake and die under my shoe, it's disgusting...
The pool at last has a water in. Unfortunately, it's not a clear blue water but a water from a river nearby. Sounds bad, doesn't it? ;P But well, I would have no objections to sit in a water in the river so what's the difference if the water comes to me and I can still sit in it but using the pool?
In the evening we had a bonfire. Shame that without anything to make on it.. Some people from the camp drank too much and they acted stupidly but still it was nice to sit in a bigger group of people.
4th of July
Today I felt a bit bad, like it's something missing and I was not really myself. n the morning I wanted just to lay flat on my bed and stare on the ceiling, what was bad...
We went to the swimming pool to check if the water in it was really that dramatic. But it wasn't, therefore I was pleasantly exhausted with my arms and legs trembling a bit. I haven't swam for a while and it was so nice to dive in a cold water again. Actually, it was incredibly cold. So cold that it was hard to breathe after a while, as if your lungs decided to stiff to get you out of there. Funny feeling :3
Before dinner we, me, Kuba and Bartosz, went on a trip to find something nice to draw or paint. We took all needed stuff, packed our cardboards and fibreboards to paint, all those brushes and paints, a blanket, water and so on and there we went. We were going and searching for inspiration till we saw a shop. There we bought some beers and chocolate bars and we went back 'home'. It was very very constructive, I must say *nods* Rest of the time we spent on our balcony drawing and painting what we could see from it and we could see a lot of things ;) And before supper we went swimming again. Boys are weak, I was swimming all the time and they were exhausted after 2 lengths of the pool. Somebody needs more exercises :]
This time on the critique meeting my today's works were praised and I got a task to make at least 4 of them everyday. That's a lot but there must be a reason why I've taken so many different kinds and sizes of paper with me, right?
5th of July
As I had promised myself I went swimming before breakfast. It surprised me that I did it so willingly. However, they were changing water and the pool filled to the half and there was no possibility to swim in such a shallow water, what made me sad and this surprised me even more. Fortunately, there was more water after breakfast so I went then and swam till I could not breathe. It did not take too long because the water was icy cold, it made me limbs numb in a half of a minute. It probably was even colder before breakfast but it does not discourage me from going there tomorrow in the early morning :)
I was supposed to make 4 Art Camp Pieces everyday so I've decided to make 2 before dinner and 2 after it, with a free time after supper for doing nothing or drinking :3 Since I had too much time before breakfast (because of the pool being inaccessible in that moment) I did my A Piece A Day works for today and yesterday . Why I did not do anything yesterday? Well, I was finishing my work from the 2nd day - it's made on the laptop and I couldn't find enough time to finish it on one sitting. So I was making it in parts on Thursday, Friday and Saturday. Here are those 2 works made today:
After breakfast and after swimming I did two Art Camp Pieces. I like the first one because of it's simplicity. However, I don't like minimalist works too much so I added few details here and there and just used more lines that it was necessary and much more than it was really there to draw.
In the second one I really like the idea. The girl you can see is a Slavic goddess of a forest, named Lesovikha. She has few forms in which she can appear and one of them is an enormous lady dressed in white. The view can be seen on a way to the pool :)
Every time I stop drawing or doing anything where my whole attention is needed I start re-thinking 'Full Moon' again. No, it's not 'again' - it's 'still' or 'all the time'. It makes me feel a bit sad and I miss my <3. And I want to read fucking 'Eclipse' right now!
Thankfully, when I made myself a brake today just before starting thinking about Bella and Jacob a song from 'Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix' started playing and it brought me back to normal. Can't wait to see the new Harry Potter movie, it will be incredible :3 Wonder how much more I will like Hermione and Luna after it. It's getting darker and darker in HP movies and it always brings me again in front of the screen to re-watch them over and over again. I'm still not bored with the 5th film, although I watched it about hundred times. Oh... it's a shame I did not take it with me here ;)
Before going on another barbecue/bonfire (it was a bonfire in a barbecue’s place) I started making my new ID. Well, I don't know if it will end up as the ID at the end but even if not - a new pixel art is a lot of fun :3 Here's what I did, it's not finished yet.
6th of July
Starting a day with swimming totally suits me :) It makes my day more calm. Don't know why swimming always calms me down (not that I'm a nervous person but there is always possibility to be even more calm) and it makes my brain rest from troublesome issues and problems; it re-loads my batteries. When I'll be a big girl I want to live near a swimming pool or have one on my own.
After breakfast we (Bartosz and I) went drawing and creativeness was floating in the air around us :3 Although, we didn't go far I'm very pleased with my work. It looks incredible when you watch it through squinted eyes.
After a while Paweł and Słowik came and the former draw me :) Twice! Actually there were even more drawing with me and Bartosz because a girl from a different University drew us too - we surely looked very inspiring to be a cause of so many drawings :D
Here are two made by Paweł:
And here are those made by the (unknown) girl:
It's funny to be an unsuspected model.
I got the first two works as a gift; later on I will ask that girl if she'd like to give me her sketches of me too. It would make quite a collection, the first two will be hung in frames as soon as I come back home - it's already decided.
This evening was the most silly and productive from all those evenings we've already had here. All our group met, together with our teacher, we drank, laugh and made fun of everything and everyone. Later on Słowik started a group of drawings connected with world 'cock'. He made a lot of them and then, in the shadow of the night, we went to stick them into a wall outside a building where part of the Art Camp's folks lived. It's also a wall next to which constructive critiques are given after supper - wonder if this little exhibition will last till then for more people to see.
If you're not Polish you'll not understand it because those our Polish sayings unable to be translated into a different language.
Dla wszystkich Polaczków ze skrzywionym poczuciem humoru:
We cried from laughing when he drew it. It's incredible what one's head can hold inside.
7th of July
Just after breakfast Kate came and asked me if I want to take part in a debate about the borders of artistic freedom. We knew about it before going to the camp but then it was presented as a debate of volunteer students. Here it appeared to be a debate of 8 Big Heads and students can participate if they want to. None of them applied till then, though. I said I will try to write something intelligent and interesting but I was not promising anything special. To be true, I was thinking about writing a speech or an essay to declare with some smart quotes and difficult names in it but when I've found out it's not obligatory the need to write it suddenly disappeared. I started to regret that laziness then...
Still, before getting down to anything speech-like I was in a group of people who were supposed to create posters advertising this debate and I spent some time on it. I don't really like brainstorming in conditions like this when, even if your idea is great, you can not make whatever you'd like to because of the lack of the materials and supplies. So most of the ideas went to trash as soon as we saw on what kind of paper we have to do those posters. Then, the simplest idea appeared to be the best.
I was so so sooo much pissed off before the poster even began to be made because of all those insects around me. I really don't know if I was the only one they've decided to bite that day?! The tangled in my hair, bumped into my face and tried to bite me wherever it was possible. One of those bitches bite me in a shoulder and that was enough. I went back to my room and played some energetic songs too loud to just stop thinking about being so angry. It helped after a while and it was when I decided to go outside alone and sit somewhere undisturbed and try to write a speech or essay for that silly debate.
Since I knew the Big Heads will talk mostly about the theoretical parts, I wanted to make it more mine, in a very MINE way. So a kind of story came out of it :D It's weird to write a story to read on a debate but, after all, it's a debate about the borders of artistic freedom, so they could say absolutely nothing against it :3 Still, I was a bit unsure of the appropriateness of my work. I have never taken part in anything like a debate because I hate talking in front of more than 5 people. I don't really like bring people's attention to myself by TALKING. If I really want to be noticed I'd rather DO something. Therefore, it astonished me a bit that I signed in to participate in that debate. Maybe I was in shock :P
Shock continued till the moment the debate started and right then I was too anxious to breathe properly >o< I thought I was going to faint.
But I did it and people said it was OK :3
I drew no Art Camp's Pieces that day. It passed so quickly I hadn't even noticed. But I did A Piece A Day work :3
8th of July
A thunder woke me up that day. After a quick check of the time I decided that it's not worth getting up and going swimming. Boys thought the same because none of us noticed that the rain stopped just before it was the exact time to go out to the pool. The sky was quite clear when we got up for breakfast so we decided to go after it. As it usually is - maliciously - it started raining heavily when we were already in our swimming suits :P But it was not enough to scare us and make us change our idea - we went swimming in the rain. And it was marvellous! It looked incredible - so many rain drops hitting the surface of the water. Another drops, this time from the pool, hitting your face from the below. It was like being in a place where rain falls from all directions :D Try it too if you'll have a possibility, I recommend :3
After swimming I had nothing to do. I wanted to write something here but Kuba was using the laptop; I wanted to read a book, of any sort, but both of the books that boys took with themselves were mine in the first place; I wanted to draw something outside but it was too wet to go anywhere and it was raining from time to time in the most unexpected moments - so I decided I will sleep till dinner. I even had some dreams but I don't remember them now...
Dinner was shitty as always, I'm sick of this food. So I went to buy myself some yoghurt, it tasted great in comparison to the dishes served here. It would be like a punishment for me to eat things like those here for more than 10 days. I'm longing to some normal food, more cheese and less sandwiches :3
Later on I decided to check my new "Artistic Sketching Pen" (as it is called) in action. I did 2 illustrations and it almost died while making the second one. Why those expensive pens always last so short? It's better to buy those cheaper ones and even if they die after one piece it's not such a shame since you can go and buy another one effortlessly... What brings a subject of another pen I bought together with the almost dead one. It was cheap and there is no problem to buy same ones back in my city so it's a big advantage. But I lost it somewhere :( shut.
We had only few hours left for the final constructive critique and choosing the best of our works for an exhibition and for the contest. So we sat down to work and started finished several of the works, changing some aspects of the others and staring new ones to make more to choose from. I fixed a little but made a brand new piece - sketched 2 days earlier as a base for watercolour painting but because of the bad weather I was unable to finish it the way I wanted. I think it was a good idea to make it with ink after all. Just look :)
I was so sleepy soon enough that it was impossible to stay awake. Later on Kuba and Bartosz said I was making sounds like a rabbit when I was asleep. No one have ever told me I was making noises!
9th of July
It was the day of a final assessment. Teachers from each school choose representatives in form of works from every student they were supervising. Then works were shown in front of a jury and they choose winners and laureates. Two of my drawings were chosen by Kate but I could feel I don't stand a chance - they wanted paintings, not drawings :/ Still, Paweł, Marta and Bartosz had paintings and they were shown there too. I kept my fingers crossed for them all the time. Their works were so much different from the others. It sometimes looks as if all other schools were making paintings in the same way and on our University everyone creates various pieces. There are no two similar works made by two different people in our school.
However, in comparison of the teachers and lecturers our school is not that great. Our teachers show us tips of how make something and slightly suggest that something else should not be made. In those others universities lecturers have their own very strong opinions and they make students think the same way. It's not good to impose your views on somebody but they make it with such an incredible amount of arguments and advantages that students can take from this path of creating that it seems impossible to not listen to them. It would be amazing to be on an university where teachers' opinions are as strong as student's ones - the art made there would be breathtaking and unique. But are there schools like this? :3
The time of the verdict came.
Paweł won one of the prizes with his amazing paintings and he, together with Marta and Bartosz, will be in the official catalogue. I'm so so so glad he won because he showed a very different attitude to painting than the rest of the winners. Marta's and Bartosz's works were unique too, just look:
Later on a final party was organized and we drank a lot :) Final parties are cool, I could say. Free barbecue and fancy songs on a dance floor - it's what can keep me up until the morning.
10th of July
Home, sweet home, where are you?
After morning swimming and shitty breakfast we started packing our things and got ready to departure. I always thought that 10 days of any art camp is too little - 14 days would do it better. It is always the same - you start creating freely and without any pain on the 7th or 8th day so you have too little time to make wonderful pieces, to really feel the atmosphere of the place. I would like to stay longer there but with my own food :P and with more money for beers because it appears that they cost quite a lot in comparison with other expenses like ice-creams and yoghurts and a pen ;P
Journey back was quicker and more pleasant than the first one. We had fun together, a pack of weirdoes ;) Shame it will not always be that way. Holidays is such a different world than normal, everyday life. Still, some things last very long. It just makes me wanna hug *hug*
On a way back I was informed by Paweł that me and Kuba look like siblings, or rather act like ones ;P There must be something true in this... He is a good person to bit up from time to time, to laugh at, to have fun with and to pissed off by (oh yeah, he pisses me off frequently.. ;P). It always makes me wonder how other people see things, for example me spending time with Kuba and Bartosz; how does it look in somebody's eyes. Shame that so few people say it out loud like if they were afraid that it may offend the object of observation what is silly. It's only an observation, something you see and think about - it's nothing wrong in having your own opinion about something.
Good thing about coming home - my mum and sister made muffins! :D
