Category: Writing

You're So Good...!

14/8/2015

I heard it again today, for the 47th time. From one of the school mums, as is often the case. As I'm making playdate plans or dropping off a kid I might explain my schedule or sweaty state in that I have been to/going to the gym. They almost inevitably say: "Oh you're so good!"

I'm not training to be "good".

I do 15+ hours a week at the box/gym/Forge training, plus travel time. That's time that could be spent doing wholesome things with my family, volunteering in the community or earning income. I spend $150+ a week on fees, equipment, supplements, and travel to competitions. That's money that could be more virtuously invested, saved for a family holiday or donated to charity. Those would be "good" things to spend it on.

I suspect this is what many women mean when they think of working out as being good. Trying to look attractive to pay the debt they think they owe for being female.

In Western culture there is a deep rooted, historical correlation between the perception of female goodness and being thin*. A modern expression of this is our pervasive Fat Phobia. Stacey Toth of Paleo Parents writes in a blog post Dear America, Get Over Your Fat Phobia of her own experiences. "I was once obese. And I am the same woman then as I am today. I’m smaller. Smarter, perhaps. But there’s no reason I should be treated differently today than I was 3 years ago – and sadly, I am." She writes about how fit and strong she is while still being "overweight", and the negative reactions to her appearance she endures.

Am I training to get skinny, or because I'm scared of fat? Hell no. I've wasted enough of my life hopelessly, hungrily, trying to beat my evolutionary conditioning. At 34, I'm proud to say that I'm too old for that shit. From my own and other people's experience, I'm certain that trying to be skinny only leads to misery. It's not a worthwhile pursuit.

In powerlifting, bigger supports stronger. I'm a few kilos under the weight limit for my class and easily keep my weight stable. I don't eat much sugar or junk food not because I fear getting fat, but because it makes me feel sluggish when I want to go fast. Burning calories is rarely on my mind when I'm training. Getting stronger and faster is.

So it's not about being"good", or about getting skinny. So what then? Why do I train? It would be foolish to have it occupy such a large chunk of my life without knowing for what purpose.

I'm definitely not training to fill in time.

I'm not training to post gym selfies or have cut abs. I'm not doing it to stay young, or to hold the eyes of my husband. I'm not doing it to pay rent for the space I occupy labeled "female".

I'm not doing to inspire anyone, or be a good example as a parent, to support my local box.

I'm not doing it just so I can eat crap and not get fat, or for the endorphins, or to socialise.

It's not out of habit, duty or obligation either.

I don't train to earn respect or to prove anything to anyone.

It's not about therapy or for my mental health, or even because it's fun.

These days it's not about getting fitter, to beat chronic pain, or to gain confidence. I ticked those off within a year of normal CrossFit classes.

Many of these reasons above are legitimate and do serve as motivation, some of the time. None of these are enough, even altogether, for me to train the way I do.

I train because I love competing. I want to do as well as I possibly can in every competition I do. I want to represent my country. I want to find out the potential of my human body.

I train out of bloody-minded, selfish ambition.

Some of the minor scrapes and bumps I've gathered over a few years of CrossFit. Does CrossFit make attractive shins? Hell no. Still worth it? Hell yeah.

Some articles I have read recently that have set off my thinking (besides being told I am good for the umpteenth time) for this blog post:

The Ronda Rousey Effect and Why Strong Still Isn't the New Skinny
I'm Too Old For This
Letter to My Daughters: Do Not Be Good

*See, for example:
The Wikipedia on Anorexia Mirabilis, and
An article from The Guardian about historical and modern anorexia.

Do you work out? Work out what? Or do you train? For what?

Comments

The Psychopathic Beast

27/3/2015

Comments

Number One Son is quite a writer. He is eleven and is a fairly dramatic kid. Here is a piece of descriptive writing that he did for school about learning to unicycle.
I thought it was pretty funny and thought you might enjoy it too. Reproduced with his permission.

Getting bucked off again. Over four sessions at school he didn't really get the hang of it, but he did get perhaps two meters at the most. Which is pretty good, those things are DIFFICULT.

The Psychopathic Beast

The devilish thing seemed to grin at my bloodied knees, enjoying my pain and suffering. The unicycle dared me to jump on its back, to get pummeled back to the ground. I was afraid. But there was the cry, “Come on, get on your unicycle.” No surprise there, but I hesitated, still staying back from the monstrosity I was ordered to ride. I cautiously slid to the unicycle, dreading what was to come. Blam! Now was no different. My knees, bloodied ever more, were not eager to move my legs towards the unicycle.

Suddenly I felt a rage, “How dare this thing be the master of me?” How good it would feel to tear it apart with my newly found strength. To crush it, to destroy it. But I could feel that dream would never become reality. The unicycle had the upper hand. I was doomed. “Come on get on your unicycle”. That dreaded cry. I hopped back on, you know the story. Hit the ground again. Bit the dust. The gritty, hard, now-red dust.

To think some people do it like it’s a piece of cake. I wonder if they went through the same torture as me. But worse, to go through more than I already had would drive me to sure insanity.

I stood up. Determined to conquer the terrible beast. Even though I knew I never would get it done today. I rose up seemingly stories tall over the unicycle, ready to conquer, to crush it with a touch of my fist.

I went back, happy with what I’d done. The great beast was helpless in my grasp, the beast they call a unicycle.

Number One Son looking dramatic. This dramatic landscape is Surat Bay, in the Catlins.

Comments

"Do You Care?" Exhibition, and a Painting that is Too Vulgar to be Included

21/3/2015

Comments

The Exhibition

Currently on at the Lakes District Museum and Art Gallery is a group exhibition by three local artists, Marion Marquand, Sue Wademan and Susan Cleaver. The artists are showing colourful, intriguing work that is well worth the trip to Arrowtown to see. But of the artwork that was submitted for this exhibition, it was one that was excluded for reasons of supposed vulgarity that I found the most interesting.

Part of the gallery showing Marion's work on the left and Susan's on the back wall.

Marion Marquand's art in this exhibition is overtly didactic. Her body of work shown in this exhibition is the most relevant to the title "Do You Care?" Almost all of her paintings include text written directly to the viewer that details the subject matter of the work. She addresses a wide variety of subjects, including ecological destruction, religion, feminism, the oppression of the poor by the greedy and urban development around Queenstown. Marion's paintings use a wide range of technique and style to suit the message that she communicates.

Marion has lived and traveled in many places all over the world. Her first hand experience of local histories and cultures and the industrialisation that inexorably changes them informs the subject matter of her work. Pictured here is "The Demise of the Divine Feminine", a large 3D multimedia work. Here she uses her direct, vivid style to illustrate goddess of creation from ancient cultures. The goddesses have been built like a relief sculptures, with each in their own partition of a shrine-like painting. The colours behind the goddesses remind me of outer space, a fitting background for these divine representations.

Marion Marquand's "The Demise of the Divine Feminine", 3D mixed media.

A variety of materials and surface is implemented by Susan Cleaver to show the rich colours and absorbing design of her art. She uses found and photographed images to make photo mosaics, mandala images and cut collages in her wall-hung artwork, and has had images printed onto fabric to make various household furnishings and a jewel-like peacock dress.

The back lit glass panels with butterflies and foliage printed on them attest to her technical proficiency in a range of media. A detail of one, "Blue Butterfly/Koru Fern" is pictured below. It uses image sparingly and light subtlety to give full impact to the pristine colours illuminated through the glass.

Detail of Susan Cleaver's "Blue Butterfly/Koru Fern", digital print on glass.

Sue Wademan's textiles are a delightful play of colour and light using the materials and techniques embroidery, a minority practice in the world of Fine Art. Sue's landscapes are skilfully built in large and small format, using atmospheric perspective and shimmering highlights to give depth and mood. Her large format landscapes are gently dramatic. Unfortunately I couldn't photograph any of them well due to gallery lights reflecting off the glass.

Three of her "Prayer Dresses" are also included in the exhibition. These are made from silk saris in luxurious colour and hung to be reminiscent of buddhist prayer flags.

Sue Wademan's "Last Light", Appliqué and embroidery.

The Vulgar Painting

And the painting that was too vulgar to be shown in this gallery, due to school children visiting? "Why Is It the Most Vulgar Word in the English Language?" by Marion Marquand. I saw this work where it presently hangs in her studio at the Queenstown Arts Centre and found it's message very intriguing.

Marion's artist statement, a slightly shorter version of which is the text in the painting:

You may not be aware that cunt is a very ancient European word which simply named a woman’s genitals. It appears in ancient Basque, Old Norse, Old Frisian, Latin and Middle English. The medieval church believed that women disempowered men and led to their ruin. They gave cunt teeth and called it ‘The Mouth of Hell,’ as is illustrated in this miniature in the Winchester Psalter, c.1150. Cunt became an obscenity – an offence to print or utter. Why is it still the most vulgar word in the English language today?

The painting is in two halves, the right half the text and the left Marion's reproduction of a drawing in a medieval Psalter. The illustration of "cunt" on the left side shows a monster's mouth, open wide, containing demons delightedly torturing the men who have been entrapped. A solemn faced angel holds a key in the lock to this abhorrent place.

Good point Marion, why? Why is it the only word that still has some power to shock? Why does a name for anatomy distinctive to women the worst insult you can give?
Vaginas are not actually abhorrent things that only lead men to their ruin. But the words we choose are how we build ourselves. They communicate ideas about the culture we were brought up and live in. Sometimes swearwords are the right words at the time to get our point across or express the situation. But they all have original inexorable meanings that subtly affect our lives. If its not a bad thing, why use it as a bad word? Marion is asking us to be aware of our words.

"Do You Care?" is on until Sunday the 29th of March. The exhibition has been curated by the Lakes District Museum and Art Gallery to a good exhibition standard. Spot lighting is employed so that viewers are walking around in semi-darkness with lights showing off the artwork, most of which has it's own glow engineered by the artists who are skilled in light play. Prints of " Why Is It the Most Vulgar Word in the English Language?", among other prints are available, and most of the original artwork exhibited is for sale.

And check out this Shakespearean insult generator if you need some help in thinking up imaginative insults!

Do you care? How do you use the word 'cunt'? Have you seen the exhibition? What did you think? Comment below!

Comments

First Blog Post!

19/2/2015

Comments

This blog is a personal record for me. I’m no expert in anything, but I’m learning all the time and you are most welcome to join me.

Way back in Art School, when I was having an existential crisis of the sort that Art School students are prone to, a tutor told me “find out what you like, and make that”. So I did, it worked for me, so I've been doing that ever since.

This blog will be eclectic because my life is eclectic.

I like lifting heavy

I like learning - science, art, psychology, history

I like exploring the land around me

I like metalwork, specifically hand making silver jewellery

Why blog?

It's about time I made a website for my jewellery. The Anna Claire Art Jewellery Facebook Page is useful, but I want a base for all my stuff, done the way I want it to be. I'm impressed with Weebly, the web-hosting server I'm using. I went from never having tried to build a website to this in a couple of weeks. But if you know more than me and can see things I could be doing better, please let me know!

I love to learn, but without documenting what I’ve learnt, I tend to forget it all again. I want to record the things that go on in my life. Some things are funny, some stupid, some beautiful, but all the things can be valuable. Writing is, for me, an effective way of processing events and ideas. Writing takes a wispy idea or a potentially useful fact and turns it into something real that I can put to work to get results.

Recently I lost my religion, and without the idea of heavenly rewards to work towards I realised that life is too short to stuff around. I want to live my life with purpose. Work towards goals. Be happy and do what I can to make others happy. Keeping a good record of goals, progress towards them and things learnt along the way is a tool to help me live my life well.

Maybe blogging is just shouting into the wind. But that’s ok, this blog is here for me and I’m fine with just that. But if the things that I learn along the way might be in any way helpful to you, join me here, on my Facebook Page or my Instagram and we'll do the best we can at this 'life' thing.

Comments

You're So Good...!

The Psychopathic Beast

The Psychopathic Beast

"Do You Care?" Exhibition, and a Painting that is Too Vulgar to be Included

The Exhibition

The Vulgar Painting

First Blog Post!

Author

Archives

Categories