thesilententrance

thesilententrance, originally uploaded by eastaltus.

I started my day job four years ago, training with another girl who looked like she wanted be anywhere in the universe except there. I didn't give her too much thought at the time, I was pretty focused on looking busy and interested. We went our ways within the company, it wasn't until she was fired that we actually started hanging out. She moved into an apartment near mine. I would come over ,hang out on her roof under her laundry line and listen to Modest Mouse. Courtney was getting out of a relationship, I was just getting into one with a pianist that would turn into a lengthy lesson in existentialist angst. We would talk about music, art love and life, and enjoy being low maitenance friends.
As time progressed with the pianist, I started sharing a new art studio with another friend and was determined to chain-smoke, paint and be professionally moody. Courtney eventually took a job out in the sticks to teach, play violin and live in a snow hut. She would pop into town unannounced to hang out at random intervals and check out my new work. Her surprise visits became fewer and farther between until only postcards with no return addresses popped in.
I do miss Courtney, but I think that I really miss the shoestring lifestyle we enjoyed back then more, the simple pleasure of zero expectation company, the carefree discordant time of my life forever tied to Indian summer and Modest Mouse.
I made this painting at that studio for my Camus pianist girlfriend at the time, but alot of people who see it say the figure looks like Courtney. An old man in the street who saw the painting as I was carrying it to a show said the figure really looked more like me. Whomever the figure subconciously resembles, I think the thing that is more important to me about this painting is the feeling of wanting to be anywhere else but here and now, Someone noticing and the various events that follow.