definatalie.com » A Creative Career

How to write a fancy-ass paper

Natalie — Thu, 22 Jul 2010 02:34:02 +0000

I’m trying to get started on my paper for the fat studies conference and, like usual, I’m not making a very good start. I’ve written this outline about 10 times but I’m struggling with all the filler. By nature I’m rather a succinct person and once I’ve written something I am loathe to repeat myself. I guess for me the outline is good enough. If I was really ballsy I’d leave it there and fly down to Sydney and improvise the whole thing!

I’m also struggling because this paper is about me, and it’s about my experience as a fat woman on the internet. I’ve used the internet to write about the minutia of my life since about 2001, so when I have to take many steps backward and write about all of it from a distance it enters an awkward memoir zone that I do not want to enter for a few reasons.

I’m 29 and although I’ve lived a fairly interesting life I don’t consider myself to be in any kind of position to be writing a memoir. I haven’t done anything significant!
THIS. IS. ACADEMIA! *kick to the chest* I’ve written little about how academia intimidates me but I am truly scared about presenting this thing in front of an audience of people who are a lot smarter than me. Then again, many don’t have my experience so I guess I am in a position to tell them all my anecdata, but still. SCARED PANCELESS.
What if I can’t remember things? My memory is not very good. What if I embarrass my loved ones by telling stories about myself they’re not comfortable with? Even though part of my charter in life is to talk about uncomfortable and awkward and challenging things, I still feel this overwhelming pressure not to embarrass anyone!
In my experience as a very technologically savvy person I’ve been dismissed by many people as trite or not connected with reality. Basically my paper is about being a fat person on the internet, and I feel a lot of insecurity about both these things (and indeed the premise of my paper!) because fat women are totally not taken seriously, and also because the internet is seen by many as a funhouse or sorts. It’s for porn and it’s for lolcats. It can’t possibly be a meaningful part of a person’s life! (No! It can! That’s why I’m presenting this paper! Listen to me! Please!)

There’s a notion that process should be hidden in favour of exhibiting a finished piece in all its glory. Part of the reason why I blog is because that notion really doesn’t help me. I feel it only adds to the mysterious aura of creativity and how many perceive it to be god-given, and not a bunch of hard work. Let’s not kid ourselves: creating stuff is very hard work and it involves a lot of thinking and process. After writing out that list, I feel a sense of… having given my anxieties form. And you know what? Those shapes and forms are exactly the sort of things I want to illustrate in my talk. Writing helps me flesh out problematic concepts, and this realisation may well be the key to writing this paper!

So, I will hit “Publish” on this collection of ramblings to record this difficult process. I hope I’m able to approach the paper more easily now!

Your work area

Natalie — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 10:48:57 +0000

We don’t have much space in our apartment, but I have the privilege of being able to take up a whole room for my nefarious creative activities. Working anti-clockwise: one corner is filled with my computer and desk, with printer and scanner; a filing cabinet is tucked next to the door; right beside that is my sewing cabinet; and the last corner has my other work table. I divide my time mostly between the computer and the other table, and it has a few purposes.

This is how it looks by default. I use a slanted drawing board to help with my RSI, but if I’m doing general crafts or Gocco printing I remove it and put it under my desk so I can use the whole desk to cut, paste, print and assemble.

I also use it to photograph small things inside my lightbox, kindly given to me by my friend Bec before she moved away from Brisbane.

I would love to have a work area like Martha Stewart’s, it is My Dream Work Room. It deserves capitalisation!

We spend so much time working (especially if we love what we do) that it seems silly not to indulge ourselves in a fantastic space! Unfortunately being a renter we don’t really get to have a say in the wall colour or anything really that involves putting holes in the walls. Ideally I’d have a room with lots of natural light and ventilation, bogloads of storage space and shelves, and big wide desks!

Do you have any requirements for your dream work area? I’d love to hear them.

My Talented Friends – part 3

Natalie — Wed, 13 May 2009 15:25:58 +0000

In this exciting installment I divulge five more names from my list of the world’s up and coming awesome folk. They dabble in writing, modelling, designing, entrepreneurship, art and being pretty cool.

Heidi – writer and fat celebrity

Heidi has to be one of the sweetest and most honest people I have ever met, even if we’ve only hung out via email and IM and never shared a coffee. Over the past few years, Heidi is one of the amazing people who have provided me with support and love, not just for my career but personally and emotionally too. Last year I collaborated with her to create the “Pretty Face” t-shirts – a reaction to one of the lines often heard by fat people. Dammit, of course I have a pretty face, there are no buts! (You can buy the Pretty Face shirts from her etsy store!)

Chloe McGenn – artist

Chloe started painting last year, and I have been amazed at her progression! She paints cupcakes and animals and other things in a very whimsical and colourful style, and is now selling greeting cards with prints of her original artwork on them.

Anekie – model and designer

Ms Anekie is a most delightful young lady, with various talents that extend to being incredibly photogenic and creating beautiful garments. She also has a kick arse sense of humour – something I rate very highly! See the dress in this photo? Anekie made it and modeled it, and Kate took it… it’s amazing to know I live so close to such talent.

Jesha Rowlands – t-shirt entrepreneur for Owl Movement

I have only known Jesha for a short period of time and already knew how great she was, but it was only recently that I discovered that she ran Owl Movement: a t-shirt company that specialises in chronically adorable gear for your top half. Because I am totally the sort of person who is impressed by this kind of thing… Owl Movement’s shirts have been worn on tv shows like Veronica Mars, VH1′s Best Week Ever and Top Chef!

Natalie Tan – illustrator

I met Natalie through Tumblr only in the last few months, but I very quickly came to adore her personality and her illustrative style. There’s a lot to be said for young women who put it all on the line, and I think Ms Tan’s star will rise pretty high because of her kick arse attitude.

Talent isn’t mystical, it’s hard work.

Natalie — Tue, 12 May 2009 22:39:00 +0000

People often tell me that I’m “so creative” and that they wish they could be “gifted” in similar ways. When I thank them and tell them that I’m still learning and that they can probably draw too, they usually look at the ground, put their hands in their pockets and kick at something imaginary on the floor while telling me wistfully that they simply don’t have the talent. To which I say with much enthusiasm “THAT’S CRAP!”

I have always believed that everyone can learn artistic techniques that will help them fully utilise their creativity, it’s just that the culture we’re in seems to dictate that art is some kind of flight of fancy that isn’t very useful at all; hence it isn’t developed as a priority in school curriculum. I even went to uni with the intention of becoming an art teacher so I could try and teach young people that, but quickly discovered that I wasn’t going to change the world in the ways that I had so naively assumed :P

Kirby Ferguson from Goodie Bag has an awesome name. He also has a point. You should watch the above video and be enlightened; then you should write a list of all of the things you’ve wanted to do but thought you couldn’t – and then set off on your 10,000 hours of practice.

Nothing is stopping you, except a little bit of hard work ;) (and PS: I’m still doing my hours!)

My Talented Friends – part 2

Natalie — Wed, 29 Apr 2009 16:17:36 +0000

I present to you four more of the most awesome people around, including a musician, burlesque star, jewellery designer, writer and photographer! They all have my seal of approval ;)

Sharon Walker – jewellery designer for Kittycat Black

Sharon’s polymer clay sculptures caught my eye years ago, and I got to know her through our hugely irregular but always fun Stitch n Bitch sessions. She is a huge role model for me, being incredibly focused and driven to make her business succeed and caring for a growing family as well!

Chelsea – “Erin GoBraughless” with Big Star Burlesque

Chelsea is a hot redhead who performs with Big Star Burlesque as Erin GoBraughless, the daughter of a potato farmer and a whiskey heiress whose three passions include drinking, fighting, and dancing. I think Chelsea has huge balls to do what she does – recently she even performed in a bacon bikini!

Melissa Maples – writer and photographer

Melissa has a fabulous way with words, and she is my go-to lady on what I can and can not do with the English language (though I probably fall foul of these rules daily!) She blogs about living in Turkey, and posts photos of garments with hilarious slogans available for purchase by the discerning tee collector at her local bazaar as well as other very beautiful shots of Antalya and surrounding areas. Melissa and I are suspiciously similar in personality, which is probably why I think she’s so great!

Bryn Ridd – Twist Oliver, Twist

Bryn plays the synth for Brisbane band Twist Oliver, Twist, and has always been a lovely supportive friend. He manages to have the most fabulously groomed facial hair, and always makes me laugh! Bryn also does film, photography and painting. Oh is there no end to your creative scope, sir?

My Talented Friends – part 1

Natalie — Sun, 19 Apr 2009 15:06:33 +0000

I have a lot of talented friends, and I only realised it when I sat down and thought about writing profiles on all of them to share with you here! I have friends who are photographers, artists, designers, models, performers, publishers, writers, musicians and activists. For most of these guys, I’m lucky to have fallen into their company as just a “friend” while others I met in a professional sense and then we developed a friendship. Because there are so many, I am going to break this up into a series of sorts, to allow you to digest the sheer amount of talent and creativity I have around me!

Tea Tasbihgou – jewellery designer for Sacré Coeur

I met Teayam online so long ago now! She does heaps of creative things – illustration, modelling and jewellery design. She recently started up Sacre Coeur, and creates steampunk styled accessories out of the most beautiful found objects. Of course, I chose the above image because there’s a paisley pendant in it, muahaha!

Mark Payne – artist and designer

Mark and I struck up a friendship on Red Bubble when he sent me a ffffound invite (no sorry guys, I still don’t have any and even if I did I’d give it to one of my mates!) Since then he has been one of the biggest supporters of my art practice – he even won the auction for my drawing at the Brisbane Twestival! His graphic work is beautiful – foreign worlds of fragmented and dizzying objects twisted like bright alien car crashes.

Kate O’Brien – photographer

I had the fortune of befriending Kate a couple of years ago when I was planning my wedding. I had admired her vintage-esque photographs for a while, and nervously emailed her asking if she’d like to photograph our wedding – she agreed and we became friends! She has also never done another wedding since :P

Ashley Moyer – fat activist and Chunky Dunk organiser

It may or may not come as a surprise, but I am fat and I am a fat advocate. Ashley is one of my fat activist friends: she has been a cheerleader and is running Chunky Dunk in Portland this year. Chunky Dunk events are private pool parties for people of size and their allies, and were started last year to provide a shame-free venue for swimming, bathing and bomb diving for fat folk. I really want to be Ashley when I grow up, and start Chunky Dunk parties here in Brisbane, Australia!!

Stick around for the next few days to cop a load of my other talented friends!

I am important enough to have a facebook page…

Natalie — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 13:18:29 +0000

I wasn’t going to set one of those facebook pages up because I was worried about what people would think of me but I asked people if they’d be my fan this morning and at least 10 people said they would so I thought that was a respectable amount of people to warrant being a facebook Celebrity/ Public Figure. (lolololololol!)

Be my fan!

Illustration Friday: Similar

Natalie — Tue, 09 Dec 2008 11:02:34 +0000

I was just recommending Illustration Friday to Tea when I thought I’d check out this week’s word. SIMILAR! It’s pretty awesome that I’ve done something that ties in so well quite by accident twice now! I am the IF psychic.

If you click on the picture it’ll take you to the Red Bubble page where you can enbiggen it to see the subtle variations in the hand colouring. Basically I printed the drawing out on my inkjet four times, hand coloured each girl, and then scanned them in and lined them up. It’s funny how I incorporate second generation scanning sometimes, maybe it’s the graphic designer in me? I do wish I could be one of those artists who plans everything out so that the final piece is all traditional, but it seems I like to take drawings on a journey of digital and traditional mutilation.

In which I admit that I don’t suck as much as I like to think

In other news, I just got an email this morning advising me that Heroine will be published in the 09 edition of Semi-Permanent. Props must be given to @mimobase and @annarchy for encouraging me to submit some pieces. I very nearly didn’t because I have a knack for predetermining my own failure, quite incorrectly in many cases it seems!

I am still hoping that my husband can spare the time to help me code the new layout for this here blog. I’m so sick of this layout!

Options for Gocco supplies are dwindling rapidly :(

Natalie — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 13:55:37 +0000

I’m still alive!

Natalie — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 00:40:10 +0000

I’ve just been working on stuff, you see. One of those bits of stuff is evident in the picture above… see the bunch of squiggly lines down the bottom? That’s mah paisleyz on the cover of the launch issue of Peppermint magazine!

The magazine is launching this Friday in Paddington, so I might scoot along to pick up a copy. I also contributed my pretty face drawing and some hand lettering for the fashion editorial. Peppermint is going to be pretty rad if you’re into green fashion (encompasing vintage, ethical, fair trade and hand crafted prettiness) and the first issue is freeeeee. You can get one from the following places:

BRISBANE
Bliss Ecowear – 15 LaTrobe Terrace, Paddington
Retro Metro – 297 Given Terrace, Paddington
Blue Lotus Cafe – Shop 16, Kelvin Grove Urban Village
Lyssy May – 676 Wynnum Rd, Morningside
Kropp Organic Hair Salon – 112 Bennetts Rd, Morningside
Box Vintage – 29 Vulture St, West End
The Region – Boundary St, West End
One Colour – West End Flea Markets

GOLD COAST
Inverse – 21C James St, Burleigh Heads

MELBOURNE
Bird Girl – 155 Brunswick St, Fitzroy
Meet Me At Mikes – 63 Brunswick St, Fitzroy
Thread Den – Level 1/16 Errol St, North Melbourne
Sankofa – 3/245 Adderley St, West Melbourne

ONLINE
www.ecodepot.com.au
www.ibutrade.com.au

NEW ZEALAND
www.endemicworld.com
www.kowtow.co.nz

And also from the Peppermint website, where you can organise a subscription for yourself.

I promise not to neglect you for so long dear blog. I just don’t know what to write… I have a few things happening but nothing I can really blog about, nothing seems interesting enough!