and i didn't even had to make my out of the maze

This month, a lot of my friends have asked me to be the labrat in their omnifarious avocations.
There was my friend Ping, an upcoming, IED-schooled women's clothing designer from Bangkok, who wanted me to sit in as a 'living mannequin'. The idea was cute until i realized that his fingers and hands would be all over my fragile and sensitive body, pricking layers upon layers of textile (and probably, into my skin, along the process). Oh, that, and to stand around in a dress the whole day? Ugh.

A girl friend of mine, Tina, who teaches at the Wall Street Institute, also asked me to come in for a seminar on "being uprooted". I guess she wanted me to talk about my experiences moving from one palce to another, starting new lives and starting from scratch. This one, i could get into... if not for the fact that the seminar would be held in one of the schools in Rome. Right.... with my work sched as of the moment, scratch that.

Then Albie, this aspiring photographer asked me to do a shoot with him for a series he's doing for one of the smaller but edgier galleries of Milan. I could have said yes, but then i learned that the project is to be entitled: The Naked Truth About My Gay Friend. It wasn't so much the posing around naked, but that i would have to pose around (and probably, intimately close to (on top, under and i-don't-even-want-to-think-about-it) his other women models). Sorry Albie, im just not that brave yet.

And then, Mario, this Latino guy that i volunteer with every week at the Unicef office, asked for some of my pictures because he was finishing a thesis on photography and he wanted some Asian blood for the so-called "Black" series. Now, this one was feasible enough. As i already have a ton of pictures of myself taken by me and by other people.

I don't really know for what specific purpose he used them, or what point he was trying to make, but he was kind enough to give me copies of the "edited pictures". I think these weren't just cs2-ed. But, heck how would i know. here they are.

yes, sometimes being a labrat can have advantages. For the mannequin stint, i was promised a spectacular Thai dinner. For the seminar, travel fare. For the photo shoot, a special invite to the opening and a bit of remuneration. For the black series? A free lunch at McDonald's (where we met up to give him the pictures) and where I, after months and months of not eating junk food, was magically reacquainted with the hateful but deliciously captivating world of : grease.

WORK 1

JUST TO GIVE MY FAMILY AN IDEA WHAT'S I'VE BEEN DOING WITH MY TIME.... hours and hours spent in front of the pc, learning step by step, and all by myself... i never really thought i'd get into it, i remember when i was still young and insisting that i WILL NEVER encode my stories into a computer's memory. Such an idea to me then was a betrayal of a writer's nature. I considered the humble typewriter and the simple pen and paper more faithful to the romance of being a writer. Now, however, i have re-discovered the pc as a valuable tool for communicating. This time, with images.


SOME ADS FOR A LAW FIRM












XMAS 2008 E-CARDS FOR KT





POSTER FOR PIER PAOLO'S BIRTHDAY


POSTERS FOR WORK









LITTLE ANGELS
i made these for grace, who does all the cakes herself. i had fun with the ads, and she was brave enough to choose the "gay" one!!!

WORK 2

FRAGMENTS









SOME RANDOM WORK










INDEPENDENCE DAY 2007CAMPAIGN

MORE ADVENTURES OF CESARE

THE RETURN




THE ENGINEER



THE ACCENT



PREP ATTACK

winterwind

WINTERWIND.
Wind,
why retreat
curb your cold desires
why hide behind the morning fog
sleep into dark night
come dance
your wild dance
let loose the tired leaves
and cry if you must,
your tears,
fall and wet the hungry earth
sing your howling,
end your pain,
mirror my heart,
come blow again.

WINTERWIND.

If i were thinking clearly, i would tell you, that i wrestle alone, in the dark, in the deep dark, and that only i can know, only i can understand, my own condition. You live with the threat, you tell me, you live with the threat of my extinction...i live with it too. This is my right. It is the right of every human being. I choose not to suffocate in anaesthethic of the suburbs but the violent jolt of the capital. That is my choice. The meanest patient, even the very lowest, is allowed some say in the matter of her own description. Thereby she defines her own humanity. I wish, i could say, for your sake, i could be happy in this quietness. But if it is a choice between Richmond and death, i choose DEATH. - Virginia Woolf, from THE HOURS by Michael Cunningham

MAN-CHILD

MAN-CHILD

"A man is the history of his breaths and thoughts, acts,atoms and wounds, love, indifference and dislike;also of his race and his nation, the soil that fed him and his forebears, the stones and sands of his familiar places, long-silenced battles and struggles of conscience, of the smiles of girls and slow utterance of old women, of accidents and the gradual action of inexorable law, of all this and something else too, a single flame which in every way obeys the laws that pertain to Fire itself, and yet is lit and put out from one moment to the next,and can never be relumed in the whole waste of time to come." - Randolph Henry Ash, ca 1840


I stared at the mirror.

Unflinching, unassuming stare.

WHO IS THIS MAN?

This man, who for long thought himself caged and beaten down, a damaged creature sewn together by his words and the many creations of his pen.

This man with thoughts that read as poems, with songs that sound as quiet sobs, with actions that bear the face of long-weathered toil.

Who is this man?

And i smile.

Giddily, funnily, excitedly.

I see HIM.

A man whose flickering flames are lit anew, a wildfire of new dreams, now within reach; of new passions, love and friendships continually feeding the burning core. A man aware of his past, the striking of swords that bled his flesh, and fortified his soul.

A MAN-Child.

With many more men to become within him.

seconds,
slow and fast,
their steady approach
soberly famished and cruel,
they do not wait for me,
stay their heavy hands
an ally of gentle heart
and a villain
most treacherous
most uncaring
of me.

i steal from them,
a regular thief,
snatching and snatching
slivers of diamond
wherein i store
the words that are borne
by my frozen fingers
and a much-abused pen
silently awaiting
its nearing death.

are words
kept in the cages of time
whence it was spoken,
or worded out by ink, lead
or even mere thought,
are they enclosed
in a sheath of ice
or bound
by flaming steel doors
never to escape,
and taste the breath of freedom
quick and swift,
as when they first
was liberated.

then i am
their foe,
their creator,
the weaver always weaving
thin and thick,
strands upon strands
of deeply-loved
words,
passionately making love
to the,,
even to their
prophesied imprisonment,
i breathe life into them
before taking it back.

seconds

and seconds

and more.

COUNTED LIVES.

ode of two sisters

we are sisters, you and i
we bore our children
and we bore hurt,
we bled and keep bleeding
and nurture,
they keep growing,
living and dying on us.

we watch their games,
their playing and merry-making,
their laughter strikes the same chords in the air
their shouts of glee and sudden tantrums,
thier tears at night, dreams and wishes,
our stars, our heavens,
both hear their nightly prayers
and send them to sound sleep.

we see them thrive,
in fleeting moments,
enduring moments,
see them take each second’s triumph,
each second’s fall,
take them to heart
one second to the next.

they are conquered and conqueror
kings and slaves,
heroes and traitors,
lovers and adulterers,
saints and sinners,
educated and ignorant,
laborers and bumbs,
parents and orphans,
children, our children
they are

one, with many colors,
all the same.
all different.

we love them
singly, deep and unending,
to their graves,
to lives that come after,
we shall remain
their mother.

they have gone so far,
some do not return,
their faces never forgotten,
their voices, we still hear,
and remember

and remember

for you and i
are sisters,
we,
our same earth,
our same skies,
our same waters,
will endure
their inescapable
destinies.


ode of two sisters
(of two lands, a song)