happy halloween!

Edgar Allen Ho:

you're welcome. via Jezebel.

girl crush: blondes

curly bleached hair problems

i decided to take the plunge and go full-on bleached-out peroxide blonde. i have naturally curly hair which is very temperamental. this was not the best idea in terms of the health of my hair, of course. in fact, it took a few weeks for it to stop freaking out and look half-way decent when it was down. i scoured the internet before and after bleaching and found anything by way of a complete hair tutorial for specifically bleached curly girls. so, here's my take.

special shout out to my beauty bible, The Beauty Department. their hair bootcamp guide really gave me some fantastic ideas.

first, don't freak out because your hair feels exactly like Barbie's. this is the price you pay. suck it up, and wear a loose bun and/or braid for a few days. try to avoid the dreaded and evil ponytail holder, because it might cause breakage.

second, have at your disposal, BEFORE YOU BLEACH, a super-moisturizing hair mask. i used Heaven in Hair by devacurl. it smells delicious and it is so luxe.

leave it on for a half hour/45 minutes/hour. you really can't leave it on long enough. i think the biggest hurdle of bleached hair is getting it moisturized and, dare i say, "dirty" again. think about it - curly hair looks best when you don't shampoo every day, and you let the natural oils take over, and calm your locks. when you bleach it, you strip all of that out. so, you've got to put it back in.

third, make your own oil treatment. i used The Beauty Department's recipe of a 1/4 cup coconut oil, 1/4 cup jojoba oil, and 1/4 cup olive oil. i also added some drops of lily of the valley fragrance oil, because it smelled like pasta. put gobs of it all up in your wet or dry hair. comb it through. get it all up in there, so it feels like an oily mess. do this on a saturday where you're not going anywhere in particular. slap it in a braid and bam, leave it. add more at night if you'd like. don't wash it out until the next day. and then, don't bother with shampoo. just let it chill. in fact, just don't bother with shampoo for the next week or two.

fourth, you're gonna need an everyday conditioner, since wearing oil in your hair all day everyday is just not cute. i recommend the EverSleek line from Loreal. it's sulfate and alcohol free, so, that's good. i'm not sure why. but that's what all the blogs recommend, so just go with it.

fifth, you might eventually want to wear your hair down and show of your curly, bleached blonde locks, right? well, it's going to be a frizz monster. it just is. it's freaked out. don't touch it with a hairdryer or any other heat tools. just don't. trust me. but if you want to wear it down, and have it air dry, might i recommend some products that will help?

don't mess with the "regular strength" of this - go for the extra strength. put it on right after your shower, when your hair is sopping wet. finger-comb it root to tip.

i'm kind of on the fence about this stuff - it's way too fragrant and not in the best way. however, it gives good results. slap on a gob or two, and start to scrunch. after i get this in my hair, i do an initial, very light, scrunching with a towel to take out some of the excess moisture.

THIS GEL IS AMAZING. it smells delicious, is not drying or sticky, and gives GREAT hold. after i get this all up in the curls, i scrunch more aggressively with the towel (remember, no terry cloth!) to get all the excess moisture out. then, i let it air dry for about 45 minutes, and finish off with a light misting of any old hairspray i have lying around. i do NOT recommend the DevaCurl hairspray - although it smells like lavender and i kinda want it as perfume, it is really quite drying. i recommend a non-aerosol hairspray like Tresemme.

i promise, it will get back to normal. it just takes a little time and some SERIOUS TLC. have you got questions/comments/concerns? or TIPS? shoot me a comment, below.

beautifying

latest + greatest loves from the world of beauty:

i didn't start to use foundation brushes until super recently. but THIS. this brush. magic. Marc Jacobs, The Face II brush. i can slap on my makeup any which-way, have a tonne of streaks from my other foundation brush, and this brush blends it all away without taking it all off my face. it looks like my face has been airbrushed afterwards. i no longer have to use my pore refiner - it's THAT good. and i was obsessed with my pore refiner.

Armani's Blushing Fabric sheer creamy-blushy thingy is heaven. incredibly light-weight, and infinitely buildable. you decide how much you want to put on. it glides on like a DREAM. sigh. i think i'm in love.

yes, it's $42. yes that's way too much for mascara. yes it's the most amazing, non-clumping, super-lengthening, mega-volumizing mascara ever. and i've tried A LOT of mascara.

do you have any tips or tricks i should know about? do you know of an amazing, non-clumping, super-lengthening, mega-volumizing mascara that i should know about? (yes, thank you, i've tried Diorshow with mixed results.)

inspiring

all work is by Ana Teresa Barboza.

i'm not worthy.

writing

you take photos in your studio apartment, using natural lighting against what you hope is a mostly-white background in order to better photoshop them afterwards. photoshop (kind of) works, but everything looks washed out, and it's really fucking hard to try and photograph something that is 4' x 8' when your ceilings are only 10', and you can only realistically stand about 15' away from the giant object. you import it into photoshop and everything looks horribly distorted (you clearly need a tripod) and the color balance won't get rid of the pale yellow light that always tinges everything in your apartment. you resign yourself to the fact that a studio apartment is not, in fact, a photo studio. it will just have to do.

you put the (kind of) edited photographs into a power point presentation, and begin to write meticulous notes on each slide. you start to (kind of) think about the reasons why you do the things that you do, and it all feels horribly personal and embarrassingly shallow. you dig deeper and manage to come up with something that is (kind of) acceptable. you even (kind of) impress yourself, as you've never really done this before, and you just (kind of) want it to be over with.

you start your presentation, and realize all of your meticulous notes are not visible on your screen. you don't want to waste any time, so you try and try to remember what amazing things you wrote in your notes, but only manage to mumble through, making excuses, telling things you never meant to say, and blurting out the (kind of) truth about the items. it goes okay. you go back afterwards, read your notes, and realize everything you forgot to say, and feel (kind of) like an idiot.

on presenting (personal) artwork to a group of coworkers, 10.14.13

reading

in three words.

cringe-worthy, painful, acceptance

uproariously, laugh-out-loud, riotous.

i don't know, i just started this two nights ago.

inspiring

Ole Martin Lund Bø's Deceptive Outward Appearance, 2007

stop with this. this is just too fucking cool.

the business/the news

YES.

Banksy announces a residency in NYC.

listening

CHVRCHES, The Bones Of What You Believe

Air, Talkie Walkie

Reigning Sound, Love and Curses

mesmerizing

inspiring

meditative color from Oakes Oakes.

Synchronized Field (Japanese Paper), 2012

Unified Field (contracting), 2012

Ocean Texture 2, 2010

THESE ARE PAINTINGS. mind = blown.

inspiring

recently, a new exhibition, titled ENERGY THAT IS ALL AROUND opened at the Walter and McBean galleries at SFAI. it's an incredibly comprehensive exhibition of Mission School art, with works by Barry McGee, Margaret Kilgallen, Chris Johanson, Ruby Neri and Alicia McCarthy. i went to the opening on 12 september, and it was, in a word, joyous. there were so many people in attendance, there was live music, and exuberant, relevant art. it has been awhile since i felt the surge of energy (no pun intended) that ENERGY THAT IS ALL AROUND produced. i encourage anyone in the SF bay area to check it out. you have until december 14. there is a slew of events in conjunction with the exhibition, which you can check out, here.

big shout-out to the curator, Natasha Boas, and the assistant curator Nicole Crescenzi with whom i worked at the Museum of Craft and Folk Art.

exciting

quite looking forward to the new album from Arcade Fire, Reflektor, and let's put bets on how many new songs they'll play at the concert after SNL this Saturday.

their "video" for the title song is pretty epic - you become a part of the video. meta. do it, here.

the tracklist for Reflektor is as follows:

"Vol. I"
"Reflektor"
"We Exist"
"Flashbulb Eyes"
"Here Comes The Night Time"
"Normal Person"
"You Already Know"
"Joan of Arc"

"Vol. II"
"Here Comes The Night Time II"
"Awful Sound (Oh, Eurydice)"
"It's Never Over (Oh Orpheus)"
"Porno"
"Afterlife"
"Supersymmetry"

obsessing

please please please can i have those falsies?!

i tend to be on the nerdy side, and i love The Hunger Games. when Laughing Squid posted about the costume designer, Trish Summerville, creating her OWN FASHION LINE, i almost peed my pants. IT'S SO BEAUTIFUL. i'm sure i won't be able to afford any of it, but it's fine, just reading all of the articles they have up on the site, and seeing all.the.beautiful.photos is enough for me. what's also amazing? they're featuring avant garde designers on the site. ENDLESS SOURCE OF INSPIRATION! AND, LOOK, LOOK, REVIEWS OF NYFW CAPITOL STYLE. stop. this might just be the perfect website ever. here's more:

inspiring

Sandworm

Sandworm, detail

Sandworm, detail

The Oystermen

the work of Marco Casagrande.

listening

the week before last, i was walking to work and decided to pull up an old This American Life episode. i've been doing this a lot in the past few months - especially in light of their 500th episode, i want to make sure i've listened to them all. i found two i hadn't had the heart to listen to - the two recorded after the events of 9.11. two weekends ago, i was at my parents lake house sitting by the fire and talking with my dad about 9.11 completely out of the blue. maybe we felt it looming, like it always does, around the last gasp of summer, during the weeks of back-to-school (my mother is a teacher - i live back-to-school vicariously through her every year.) or maybe it's just coincidence. either way, i find these two episodes of This American Life like a balm i didn't know i needed and/or wanted. so, on this, the twelfth anniversary, i urge you to listen to them. i found the second particularly prescient - it's like it could have been recorded yesterday or tomorrow, or a week from now, or three months ago. which i suppose makes me anxious?

193: Stories of Loss
*editors note: not the best to listen to on your way to work - gut-wrenching and heart-breaking

194: Before and After

watching

i watched Crips and Bloods: Made in America by documentarian Stacy Peralta (Dogtown and Z Boys, Riding Giants) recently, and it is a phenomenal documentary. outlining the genesis of the two most notorious gangs in American history, the Crips and the Bloods, the film does an excellent job in explaining the institutional and casual racism that ushered in a whole generation of gangbangers. in a very incomplete nutshell, after the Watts riots and during the civil rights movement, community organizations like the Black Panthers helped stifle gang activity in the area. however, J. Edgar Hoover, the police, and the "white establishment" put targets on the backs of such community organizations, leading to the assassination or incarceration of many of the leaders of such movements. this left a whole generation of black males disenfranchised and left to fend for themselves. when you give someone absolutely no hope of getting out of the situation they have been placed in (and make no mistake, the were purposefully placed there, just look at the way LA county was divided to keep "undesirables" out of white neighborhoods) their only option is to implode on themselves and the community around them.

for anyone who is interested in the historical context of how these gang wars were started, it's a fascinating and enthralling documentary. Peralta interviews current and past gang members, as well as members of the "first generation" of "clubs" (precursor to the modern gang.) i think the hardest part is knowing how little is being done to give resources to the communities - resources that are so desperately needed. you truly can tell a lot about American society when we blame people for acting in the only way they know how to, and give them no options otherwise. i also don't think it is sympathetic to gangs, but is trying to understand all of the mitigating factors that lead these communities to where they are today. i'd be extremely interested to see an update, particularly about the influx of the Mexican gangs into south central. if anyone knows of a documentary about that, please leave it in the comments.

inspiring

the work of photographer Ariana Page Rusell, who uses her body/skin to create beautiful/disturbing works of art.

Rant, 2010

Rave, 2010

Seethe, 2010

Radiate, 2010

Russell has a rare skin condition, dermatographism, that causes welts to form when her skin is scratched. pretty amazing stuff. the use of color in this series, titled Save Face, is what is so arresting to me. they evoke angry sunburns, or the musculature that lies just beneath skin. combine that with her confronting the camera while she is manipulating her skin? magic.

talking

if i had the technology i would send you a .wav of me banging my head on my desk like i did just now.
if i had the technology i would send you a video of me rolling my eyes.
maybe we should Facetime sometime soon so that i can recreate it for you. 08.26.13

oh god i know. it's awesome. no i want to go no i want to go. no i want to go but i won't. cry cry cry. Jessi laughs laughs laughs. 08.05.13

my sister is funnier than yours. and we were both born with a healthy dose of schadenfreude.