88. Alone

How we want to take a minute. Prioritizing preference, returning to film, staying ahead of burnout. Suspending tyranny.

Puzzle pieces.

In the midst of geopolitical chaos and conflagrations both open and concealed, this Friday—even more absurdly than usual—is Valentine’s Day in the United States.

My studio, where I also eat and sleep, is governed by privacy and preference. Drawings sprawl across the floor at 3 am. One drumette of fried chicken is a perfect dinner. The windows stay open at 29 ºF; espresso gets extracted before dawn without apology.

Uninterrupted by the voice, smell, or needs of another human being, I’m reminded of the—probably not wholly untrue—legend of David Lynch dumping Isabella Rossellini because her cooking created a “film” on his walls and “coated” his work.

Photographer Olivia Locher (herself a fan of Lynch) posted in customary gentle fashion two years ago about preference and romance:

Happy Valentine’s Day to all of the lovers and singles! 🌹 Romance has never been a desire of mine, I’d much rather observe it in films. 🎥 I became obsessed with photography when I should have discovered the birds and bees and the desire for physical relationships never came. Whenever I’d see an attractive man I’d think, “oh I need to photograph him!!”, and that was more than enough pleasure! I do believe that this allows me to love the people who enter my life so much fuller…maybe I love too deep. ❤️ Valentines Day puts a lot of emphasis on having a partner, but let’s take a moment to love ourselves! “Find the sweetness in your own heart, then you may find the sweetness in every heart.” - Rumi

A near-soundproof tunnel created by headphones confers me from my studio, into the streets, and eventually onto a traincar of the A express. I listen to The New Yorker’s “What Was So Special About Greta Garbo?” in long transit.

Garbo, of course, was to have said: “I just want to be alone.”

News

Despite my predilection for solitude, I’ve actually not been alone much lately 😅

This is just the nature of living in New York City, but I also have the ironic misfortune of being an introvert with severe FOMO and a tendency to underestimate how much of me there is to go around. Add on top of that near-OCD-level fastidiousness (scheduling back to back to the minute and worse, being on time), and you see how burnout happens.

In the office of a person of note at the New York Public Library, being chastised by a cast of Edgar Allen Poe’s hand.

I’m having fun, but feeling a bit squeezed. No one’s fault but my own. Negotiating with myself to get a few Sundays back soon.

엄마 나라 | MOTHER LAND (trailer) is going to Palm Springs. The American Documentary and Animation Film Festival (AmDocs) generously offers to host filmmakers, and I really want to go.

KAAC finished round two of install, and all the artwork is finally up at Golden Hof. The space looks incredible; I can’t wait to share photos. The restaurant opens to the public this spring.

Celebrating successful end-of-install at the excellent Tusk Bar in NoMad.

I’ve taken on the role of thesis advisor for an SVA MFA Design candidate. This is yet another thing, but one of my goals this year is to give back more to young designers and artists. In any case I enjoy it, and it’s an honor to be sought out for guidance.

We just had our all-day orientation for the New York cohort of Jerome Hill Artist Fellows. Truly in awe of my peers; it’s surreal to be a part of this picture.

I’m nearly finished with a draft of another essay in Absences, a collection I’ve been working on since last year. I plan to review with my Periplus mentor later this month.

I’ve been attending StoryStudio Chicago’s “Pub Crawl,” an extremely well-organized, month-long publishing intensive. This is another perk of being a 2025 Periplus Fellow, and I’m learning a ton. Highly recommend to all writers.

Studio

I’m back to working on my animated short film.

Fresh notes and sketches.

It took a minute to re-engage with work that I’d set aside for months.

Old notes and sketches.

Picking the path back up often feels akin to inheriting someone else’s code; slogging through their comments, refamiliarizing myself with the terrain.

More old notes and sketches (on the backside of prints).

As I dive back in, I’m pulling back from the comfort of animating pose-to-pose, and the convenience of doing it digitally.

Some sequences will benefit from the dreamy, liquid quality of straight-ahead (Moth is a beautiful example) while more complex movement will be better suited for pose-to-pose. I like the idea of incorporating this kind of texture into my next film, and believe the practice will benefit my sense of timing and spacing.

Drawing faster and looser on paper.

Of course, the lightbox died almost immediately.

iPad-as-lightbox was a poor stopgap for obvious reasons, even with a glove:

The replacement does give me a chance to finally go wireless:

Working on paper has been creating more distance between labor and effect. After drawing my lines, I have to scan them in and process them digitally before I can see what the animation feels like.

A numbering system for in-betweens.

This feels analogous to taking photos on a film camera, and I experience what I imagine is the same kind of anticipatory excitement. I think being forced to animate “blind,” to “do the math” in my head, will do a lot for my technique and instinct.

Animating on paper is relatively unfamiliar territory. It’s uncomfortable and slow. This is not a bad thing. Balancing essay work with film work to this degree is also new, and for the moment, a huge question mark. I think it’s important that I remain flexible and iterate based on what I learn.

Provisions

Take in good things to make good things.

Beauty feeds. Frenchette baguette, Nova, jambon de Paris, flying fish roe.

1. Elysian Fields by BKE kombucha · libation
   I’m drinking less alcohol. My body appreciates this but it’s a little sad because I love martinis, and I love champagne. This is a very good substitute for the latter.

2. The Mark by Aletha Health · hip hook
   Like most people, I sit more than I should. This leads to tight hip flexors which, I was surprised to learn, are often the cause of spine and other musculoskeletal problems. For the first time in probably fifteen years, a crazy knot in my lower back has begun to release after I began using this. I find Aletha Health’s documentation and video tutorials to be very high quality. YMMV ofc; I’m not a medical professional, consult yours before engaging, etc.

3. Social media, brain rot and the slow death of reading · article
   I used to read three books a week. In 2024 I think I read eight—during the entire year. This is embarrassing, even more so given the number of books I aspirationally purchase. I’m happy to say that I’m actively addressing this, and am on my fourth book of 2025.

4. Liberation · Off-Broadway
   ”A provocative, revealing, and irreverent jolt of a play about what really goes on when women meet behind closed doors.” This was amazing. Fresh; could have gone wrong a thousand different ways; soared instead.

5. Tina Berning · interview
   Oldie but goodie. If you’re a visual artist and need some process (and life) inspo, this may be particularly delicious for you.

6. La Pecora Bianca · underrated NYC gem
   This is a chain Italian restaurant. Service is unrefined and inconsistent. But it’s solid: tasty food with quality ingredients that’s not exorbitant (for NYC). In a pinch, it will come through for you.

7. Nobel Literature acceptance speech by Han Kang · wisdom
   This was important for me to read and listen to. Especially now, when things are so destabilizing and faith-destroying.

8. Eleven True Things · essay
   ”Ada Limón looks back on her time in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. An excerpt of Goodbye to All That: Writers on Loving & Leaving NY.” Some day this may be me, because nothing is forever.

9. Datum Point · animation
   I saw this animated short at Animation Speak/Easy vol. 14 at L’Alliance last month and fell in love with it—but it’s not available for viewing online, at least in the States.

   Alex Dudok de Wit
   ’s article is probably the next best thing. A crazy coincidence: he mentions in this post another beautiful film (out of three) they showed at this Speak/Easy! The Man With The Beautiful Eyes, which he also reviewed.

10. Cherry pie · recipe
    ”A divinely good cherry pie, with cues from its ‘Twin Peaks’ forebear.” No notes.

In closing, suspending tyranny

I first saw Christian Marclay’s The Clock in San Francisco over a decade ago.

It is a looped 24-hour video supercut (montage of scenes from film and television) that feature clocks or timepieces. The artwork itself functions as a clock: its presentation is synchronized with the local time, resulting in the time shown in a scene being the actual time.

This film has been making its way around the world, surfacing at museums for exalted runs. It’s currently on view at New York’s MOMA (originally from late 2024 to the end of February), and though I was out of town for its 24h viewing (apparently a stipulation by the filmmaker), I have now seen the greater part of the film’s afternoon hours across three separate sittings.

One of these was from 13:06 to 14:06, and during these sixty minutes there was a prevalence of food; people are having lunch. I was fascinated. The film comes across as a dreamlike reflection of pedestrian life, and the fact that it syncs to my own minute-by-minute both anchors and unsettles me.

Unlike various projects that The Clock has inspired (e.g., aclock.live), Marclay’s is not simply a sequence of clips glued together by time markers—it is not montage-by-number. There’s a lot of intentionality and artistry in the way the cuts are juxtaposed and interwoven. He takes creative liberty with segues (the soundtrack from one film might bleed into the next), and sequences from the same film often alternate with those of another, creating a bizarre continuity of narrative.

It really feels like you’re in someone else’s dream, and the experience is hypnotic. The Clock is a work of art, itself.

As I continue to grapple with my own relationship with time—pushing at the boundaries of “schedule” and the meaning of “capacity”—this exhibit, however briefly, suspends its tyranny.

If you need further encouragement:

The Clock has been described as "addictive" and "mesmerizing". The Guardian called it "a masterpiece of our times." Chris Petit complimented its "edge-of-hysteria relentlessness, the anti-narrative drive", and the simple concept, commenting that he wished he had thought of the idea himself. In The New York Review of Books, Zadie Smith stated that The Clock "is neither bad nor good, but sublime, maybe the greatest film you have ever seen."

The Clock has been extended through May 11th.

Until next time.