books to laugh and cry by

Jonathan Safran Foer's Everyting is Illuminated

Milan Kundera's The Joke

Matt Groening's Life in Hell

Well it is clear I have been on the subject of post-communist Eastern Europe, Politics, cultural uncertainty, and the beauty that can be found within sadness. Humor is so important...though it may be dark. That's why as I lay in bed feeling crushed because I have just finished yet another Milan Kundera novel "the joke"...I break out my old Matt Groening "Life is hell" comic book. The world is absurd. Always decaying further and further in that dirrection. There is such tenderness in how flawed and fragile we all are. That these authors have managed to capture this to me is the greatest gift that one can expect to offer humanity. I'm so thankfull for books...particularily these ones.

clever people make creepy people

Clayton Bailey

Justin Novak

Misty Gamble

Well what else can you say about figures that say so much. Is there such thing as going too far? Clayton Bailey himself said he doesn't like to look at his "murder victim" figure... the critics said 'God has turned his face away from Clayton Bailey'. Wow, what a review, he got Gods attention?! But there it is...it had to be made..it needed to be said. In a society were everything is kept so pent up, laying things right out on the table , is cathartic...and controversial. Under the guise of silliness these playful figures are able to address the complex and disturbing mutations of human civilization. heavy stuff. You can write a novel or instead capture a thousand words with a picture...or even better, bring an image into concrete reality through sculpture. The best thing about figure sculpture for me is that you can literally make "people" do whatever you want. So why not capture the absurd fleeting moments and emotions that no one else is supposed to see?