11.07. email with JORDAN and KIM about MS. GALLERY. See USB.

11.07. email with JORDAN and KIM about MS. GALLERY. See USB.

11.07. email with JORDAN and KIM about MS. GALLERY. See USB.

11.07. email with JORDAN and KIM about MS. GALLERY. See USB.

11.07. email with JORDAN and KIM about MS. GALLERY. See USB.

11.08. email with JORDAN and KIM about MS. GALLERY. See USB.

11.09. email with JORDAN and KIM about MS. GALLERY. See USB.

11.21. Took net to MS. GALLERY on MTA SUBWAY.

11.22. MS. GALLERY show. I held a young man in blue who smelled like sour tobacco. I held an older man in red who tried to feel me up. I wasn’t sure whether or not to let him? Am I supposed to resist? I think it made me uncomfortable. Am I supposed to be uncomfortable? Is there a boundary?

Interesting questions, in theory, but there was nothing to explain why she needed to ask those questions in the first place. The notebooks were not diaries, exactly; they were deliberate, businesslike records. The details went well beyond what we’d been instructed to do at school, though she’d clearly learned the exact Academy process from Tyler, Marlin, and Jack. I slid HOLD ME back on the shelf and grabbed the next one, FORGIVE/FORGET:

FORGIVE/FORGET: Cast bodies into a slow dance, like a high school dance. This piece is short in duration, high in difficulty.

11.17: ROBERT called today to say he thinks my material process is lacking and that I need to work harder at bridging the realist gap. He wants me to call RON and get some tips. I am scared to because I am afraid RON won’t think I am talented enough. I’m scared he’ll make me demo talent. Drank three beers, ate a turkey sandwich for dinner.

The process of her practice—paint shades, glaze recipes, firing temperatures, mold forms, shipping costs, phone numbers—were all there, a patchwork of block print in different inks. The notes contained exactly the same luxurious banalities as the last—the sort of information that would be interesting to a curator, or an art historian, or me. I wished I had the time to read them all, but it was terrifying, up here on the ladder, and I was hit with a sudden wave of guilt. I was genuinely trespassing. I quickly returned it and opened the next one, THE BURIAL PROJECT, the show I’d seen my sophomore year of art school:

THE BURIAL PROJECT: I will cast and paint body parts in different stages of decay and bury them, one by one. When one is found I will bury another one. I will catalog their discovery over the years and the confusions that result. This piece is extra-long in duration, medium in difficulty.