M&M: Nicola’s Tour

The City Castle's open air stage is dramatic, with a picturesque ruin as the back drop just so. Wonder if it might make too much of a visual statement for Yoshiko. A stray dog with a cataract in one eye befriends us. He hungers for affection but the guide books warn us against petting him. He looks much too dirty anyway.

We walk down back towards the Old Bazar, drop into a generations old shop where they still make guitars by hand. Then to the national gallery and to an old courtyard house that had become the city’s art school. The old nude model was a bit startled and I definitely crossed a line there with my video camera. But I have started my documentation of Yoshiko’s journey.

Not sure what Yoshiko is thinking. Her thought process is different. I worry how far this project will take her art as I think I am more ambitious in my goals. It is just as well she does not quite understand it anyway; it is evident she has not read my articles on re-mapping.

I would like her to develop her own creative process without getting a lot of my inchoate ideas. I guess what I am seeking is a collaborative process than the artist/producer one she has with Bonnie. I keep asking her where she thinks she is in her career as an artist.

On one hand, her integrity as an artist must be preserved; on the other, On some level I feel she needs to find her own way to appeal to a larger audience, a mature one that goes beyond the heroic challenge that artists necessarily make to established art forms. That by itself is more becoming to youth. Maturity comes down more to craft and having something specific to say, Too often is the modern artist either a propagandist or a navel-gazer. Where is the delight, wit and beauty?

I thank the Intelligent Designer (whom I’ll call Bob) I am not an artist.