Filed under: End of Year Favorite Eleven Posts
It’s the end of the year and I’m jumping on the top ten bandwagon with my list of top eleven favorite posts. These are the ones I tried to keep on the front page as long as possible, posts I was always reluctant to add a new post after. You’ll find that I’m cheating on some, selecting a whole category, but never mind. Happy new year everyone!
1 } Chair Trilogy. Thanks to my friend H’s assortment of chairs (and her generosity), I was inspired to create these four pieces. Oh, and I clearly have a huge disregard for quantification.
2 } PrettyGreenBullet | TheSecondExhibition Photos | Mohammed Alkandari. These are photos taken by my brother at my exhibition last December, held at Dar Al-Funoon Gallery. I cherish both the day and the photos.
3 } Polka-Madness on a Chilly December 5th Night. This was just fun. At least for me. Looking at the photos in bed after my PrettyGreenBullet show, I just laughed out loud. People can be so special.
4 } Book One | Body Parts. I wanted to include this on the list because it is important to me. I’ve been wanting to do these books for the past ten years I think. I’m so looking forward to the next one!
5 } Hour Drawing/Ramadan Drawing. I got so much gratification from these. For days I’d inhabit these worlds. A great escape an hour a day.
6 } PrettyGreenBullet Reader Interview | Bazaar Magazine. This was a fun interview because I had asked my PGB friends to ask me the questions. Thanks, guys!
7 } Crash. As horrendous as a car crash can be, there is some sad beauty in it. And a big fat lesson to be learned.
8 } Water, Wine & Women. My sister is game for anything. Thanks to my mom’s red sheets, my sister’s intrepid dip into the pool and Photoshop, I ended up with these shots.
9 } My New Love. Entertaining myself with my new A3 scanner. The possibilities are infinite.
10 } August Drawing. I love it when everyone decides to play! It really is rewarding and I would have been happy if this thing spilled into September, October, November…
11 } Stories of Eves Exhibition Photos | Mohammed Alkandari. What can I say, I love my brother’s take on my events. Having him there, among other dear ones, warms my heart. And seeing his photos afterwards just helps to preserve the moment. I really like his pictures.
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Filed under: Second Spiral Sketchbook, Sketchbook | Tags: ink, pen, sketch
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Filed under: The Book of Traffic Lights & Other Observations | Tags: diary, journal
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I’ve always been interested in sculpture, but it is just so difficult! Which doesn’t prevent me from playing. So I made these two lovely heads this morning. (more…)
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Filed under: Second Spiral Sketchbook, Sketchbook | Tags: christmas, sketch, spiral
Filed under: The Book of Traffic Lights & Other Observations | Tags: diary, journal
Filed under: Second Spiral Sketchbook, Sketchbook | Tags: desire, sketch, spiral, wish
today, i'm glad there's just one of me
When I was younger (a lot younger, but old enough to know better), I secretly wished that I had not only one long lost twin sister, but two, making me a third of a triplet my parents couldn’t handle when my mom gave birth to me thirteen (see? old enough!) years before in New Delhi. New Delhi (where I was actually born) was important to my secret fantasy because there, my parents found the perfect opportunity to sell off the other two. Or they were baby-snatched. Or something. You can tell I watched my share of Bollywood movies where twins are separated at birth by an evil uncle, ultimately finding each other by sheer coincidence thirty years later because of matching tattoos. I believed so hard in this impossible dream. And I prayed for it too. Just two twin sisters, God. Just two. Today, I pray my daughter doesn’t turn out like her mother at thirteen.
So have you ever have a secret wish?
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complete letter to tim pieraccini
I’m not sure how many of you know about my other blog, Raw Epistle, but the cogs and wheels are finally starting to roll. Three months into starting a blog about good old-fashioned letter writing, enough mail has been received on both sides to render me confident that this could actually work as a way of giving a long-distance ‘hello’. Who knew it would take as long as two months from a letter to get from Kuwait to its destination? It doesn’t matter because the reward of seeing letters in my mailbox is worth the wait. And the more correspondents I have, the less the wait. So I hope you join the experience because I have become addicted. (more…)
Filed under: The Book of Traffic Lights & Other Observations | Tags: diary, journal
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Filed under: Rants & Raves, Second Spiral Sketchbook, Sketchbook | Tags: sketch
i saw a guy in a huge hummer this morning, phone in one hand (against the law) and throwing garbage out his window with the other. a kuwaiti. how can i accept that he and i originate from the same country? the problem is, people like him are breeding like bunnies
I am a Kuwaiti. Am I proud to be a Kuwaiti? No. Before you take out your punching gloves, I want you to think hard about the term ‘proud to be’ and what it is to be proud of this country, my country. Now, do I love Kuwait? Yes. Passionately. And every day I fight for it. I fight by honking my horn when I increasingly see people rolling down the windows of their fancy cars to throw out a tissue or crumpled up cigarette box. I fight for my country by minding my garbage output. I fight for it by raising three decent (well, most of the time anyway) individuals who I hope will follow my lead as a Kuwaiti fighting for her country. But until the majority of the people of Kuwait start loving it the same manner I and many like me love it, I can’t bring myself to say that I’m proud to be Kuwaiti. But I sure as hell am trying to make it a place my children will be proud to say they are from. (more…)
Filed under: My Friends & Me, Other People's Studios | Tags: architecture, studio
this is the cavernous arabana hall. i can just see this place bursting with artistic life and vision within the next year
Last night I paid a visit to my friend architect/photographer/designer (I can go on) Deema Al-Ghunaim’s studio space she’s rented at the Arabana warehouse in Shuwaikh. The space is still in its embryonic stages but to know this little gem exists amid the hustle and bustle of industrial Shuwaikh is soothing to the heart and mind. I’m very excited to share these photos with you. Thanks, Deema, for the invitation! (more…)
Filed under: Second Spiral Sketchbook, Sketchbook | Tags: ink, rotring, sketch, Sketchbook, spiral
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Filed under: Book One } Body Parts, Books, Dar.Nur, Postcards | Tags: dar.nur
someone needs to build a train track from my place to dar.nur. a train wouldn't hurt either. i spy. a little blue book
I took another trip to dar.nur this afternoon. I must admit, it was business, but I just can’t help hanging around and taking photos. The place is teeming with beautiful objects. A wonderful place to award yourself an allowance and go nuts! (more…)
Filed under: The Book of Traffic Lights & Other Observations | Tags: diary, journal
Filed under: Book One } Body Parts, Books, Dar.Nur | Tags: book, dar.nur
body parts standing nice and tall at dar.nur
I have delivered some copies of my book Body Parts to one of my favorite shops in Kuwait, dar.nur. I also took ten of my framed postcards. dar.nur is the perfect place to go this time of year for fine gifts you won’t find anywhere else in Kuwait. I do hope you give it a visit.
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blah
To think I was going to throw this old lamp away. If it weren’t for a dream I had two nights ago, I would have eventually gotten rid of it. And because of that dream and the work of art I created in it, I now have a new lamp. But let me tell you, this thing was the most difficult object I have ever decopatched. It’s spherical, collapsible and spins on a moving axis, a true pain in the neck (literally). I did it though, and the result is, if I should say so myself, a lot nicer than the one I made in my dream. Don’t you love it when that happens? (more…)
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Filed under: Book One } Body Parts, Books | Tags: body, book, package, parts
imagine this under a christmassy douglas-fir
I spent this afternoon wrapping and organizing delivery of the first batch of my book Body Parts. I don’t know, maybe it’s in my blood (my mom’s a huge wrapping fiend) but I love fussing with ‘gifts’. I know these aren’t technically presents but the people who bought them should feel like they have just purchased a gift to themselves. Congratulations to them, and I do hope they enjoy the book. Happy holidays! (more…)
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Filed under: Second Spiral Sketchbook, Sketchbook | Tags: isograph, rotring, sketch
can you jump rope?
I’d like some answers to these universal questions and I’d like them soon! (more…)
Filed under: The Book of Traffic Lights & Other Observations | Tags: diary, journal
A few weeks ago I asked you, my visitors, to help me out with an interview for Bazaar Magazine by submitting questions for me to answer. The interview went online last week. You can find it here: Ghadah Alkandari in Bazaar.
I just want to take this opportunity to comment on one of my answers (the one about the best thing about being an artist in Kuwait). I must have been feeling extra catty the morning I answered the questions. There are some favorable aspects about being an artist in this country, the main one being the opportunity to exhibit and to publicly share my work with others-albeit a few. My reply was so bitchy for the sake of being bitchy and I don’t like that.
Thanks everyone for contributing and I hope you enjoy the interview!
